Nor Many Waters Page 16

  It was in a calm and level voice that he continued.

  “I can understand perfectly,” he said, “how you must feel about Mrs. Eagar’s case as it now stands. It is, as you know, a case that I was not anxious to contest. It is a case in which I should be extremely sorry to see anyone I cared for implicated. I can imagine you saying, ‘Anything but that; anything.’ At the same time I am not certain that what you are proposing to do is not a jumping out of a frying-pan into a fire. You say that you will go away; that you will be divorced quietly; and that by the time you return every one will have forgotten about it. How can you be sure, however, that that is what will happen? Are you proposing to discuss the matter with Eagar before you go?”

  “Scarcely.”

  “You think that were you to do so he would make difficulties, that he would threaten to refuse to divorce her if you went away, that it would be impossible to make him agree to divorce her quietly if you withdraw the present suit?”

  James Merrick hesitated. “I’m not sure. I’d never, I think, considered it. I… well, if you put it that way, I suppose that’s what I did imagine.”

  “And you think that by running away together, you’ll force his hand?”

  “I suppose so, yes.”

  “Then I can assure you, my dear son, that you will be doing nothing of the kind. You will be simply playing into his hand. You will have put yourself completely at his mercy.”

  “I don’t see that. What else can he do but divorce her?”

  “You mean that’s the only chivalrous thing that he can do?”

  “Naturally.”

  Mr. Merrick shook his head slowly.

  “When you have been as long in this business,” he said, “as I have, you will know that chivalrous instincts are the last thing that one can rely upon. Particularly in a case like this, where you are dealing with a man already made savage and vindictive. Had you, at the very beginning, gone to him and said, ‘I’m in love with your wife. I’m going to run away with her. She’ll never come back to you. A divorce is the only clean way out,’ there might have been a free fight; but when he’d realized that his wife’s going was inevitable he would probably have been reasonable. That was, however, at the start. You have now to deal with a very different kind of man. A man who is out for vengeance. The counter-charge proves that. In the mental condition that he is in, your going can only heighten the sense of injustice that he is suffering from. I can see exactly how he will argue it out to himself. ‘This is their new game, is it?’ he will say. ‘First of all they try and get me to let a trumped-up cruelty case’—and that is how he saw it, you must remember—‘go through quietly. When that doesn’t work, they think they can force my hand by running away together. And no doubt they think themselves very clever. They’ll think themselves less clever when they find that I’m just going to stay where I am and do nothing. A husband can’t, by English law, force a wife to live with him. But there’s no law that can oblige him to divorce her. They can go away together if they like. But never as long as I live shall they be able to live together openly as man and wife.’ I think, James, that that is how Herbert Eagar will argue it.”

  It was a point of view that had not previously occurred to Merrick. He had not conceived that any alternative to divorce would be possible to Eagar. Remembering, however, the look of blind and savage anger that he had seen during that last interview on Eagar’s face, he realized that it was precisely the attitude he would take, at any rate until that anger had abated. Even so, it was not an insuperable obstacle.

  “That’s all very well,” he said. “I daresay that’s what he may think now, and that is what he may do to start with. But it’s a cutting off of his nose to spite his face. Which is not a game that one can play indefinitely. It’s a situation which means prison for him as much as for her. Hate dies out. And, anyhow, sooner or later, he’ll want to marry again himself.”

  “Which’ll mean,” retorted Mr. Merrick, “as collusive a divorce as ever the King’s Proctor can have had a sniff at. Even if things were able to go straight through at this moment, the possibility of his intervention is a point that would have to be considered very seriously. Eagar would probably have to acknowledge that previous misconduct, and the Judge be asked to exercise his discretion; that though is neither here nor there. The point is, how long do you imagine you may have to wait?”

  Merrick shrugged his shoulders.

  “How can one say? Some woman may catch him on the rebound. He may want to marry again almost at once.”

  “And equally it may take half a dozen years. Have you considered what kind of a position you’ll be in during those years?”

  Merrick looked his father steadily in the eyes.

  “Are you trying to frighten me?” he asked.

  “I am trying to put the facts before you. I am telling you that by running away you are placing yourself unconditionally in the hands of a man from whom you can expect no mercy. As long as he chooses you will have to stay abroad. For a few months, I daresay that will not worry you particularly. But I ask you to picture what life is like in a Riviera town for a person like yourself. You will be cut off from your friends, your work, your interests. You will spend your whole time among people who, for various reasons, are unable to return to their own countries, who have nothing to do all day, who sit about in cafés, talking scandal and occasioning it. They comprise as worthless a crowd as is to be met with anywhere in Europe.”

  “One needn’t become a part of that life, Father.”

  “My dear boy, we are gregarious creatures. We must have, if not friends, at least acquaintances. We must be a part of a social life. And they will be very pleasant, often very cultured people you will find there. A few of them are definitely vicious. But for the most part they are just backboneless. They will be charmingly companionable to you. They will welcome you as one of themselves. Look at your position. A man without occupation living on a woman’s money.”

  Had his father’s voice been anything but judicial and detatched, Merrick might at that point have lost his temper. But it was as hard to be angry with his father in his home as it was easy at his office. Even so, he could not restrain an indignant outburst.

  “On a woman’s money, Father, what do you mean?”

  “I do not see that you would have any other source of income.”

  Merrick looked incredulously at his father.

  “Do you mean to say…” he began, but his father checked him.

  “Don’t please imagine that I am behaving like the father of melodrama who cuts his son off with a shilling. I am doing nothing of the kind. I am merely trying to explain to you how by running away you will be cutting yourself off. As you know, I have saved very little money. There has never seemed any need for me to. The firm in which I work is eminently sound. I imagined that when I died you would take my place. I should be leaving you, I thought, what was better than money, the opportunity of earning money. If, however, you run away now with Mrs. Eagar, you will be robbing yourself of that opportunity. Do you imagine that after such an escapade as you propose you would ever be able to return to Stone Buildings?”

  He paused. But Merrick made no reply. He had been prepared for opposition, for anger, for histrionics, but not for this calm marshalling of hostile facts.

  “It would be impossible for you to return,” his father continued. “The other principals would never permit it. Doctors and solicitors and politicians—those, that is to say, to whom the public entrusts its property and person—have to be as jealous of their reputations as any woman has. To be co-respondent in a divorce suit would be bad enough, but for you to have lived without marriage for several years on the Riviera and with a client would permanently discredit you. That, James, you must realize. If you go away with Mrs. Eagar, you are by your own act disinheriting yourself. With the best will in the world I am powerless to help you.”

  Again he paused. And it was very clear that he was waiting for his son to make the suggestion
that though his employment and salary as a solicitor must cease, an allowance might be made to take its place. A certain obstinacy in Merrick’s character prevented him, however, from making it. It was left to his mother, who had sat silent while they had talked, to speak.

  “But, darling,” she said, “surely if it’s not possible for James to go on working in the firm, we could make him an allowance? We could easily economize a little.”

  “I imagine so.”

  “Then surely if James’ happiness depends on it?”

  “If…”

  “Father…” Merrick interrupted. But again his father checked him.

  “If, I said, but I’m very certain that there’s no ‘if’ about it. You may think now that your happiness depends solely on whether you are or are not with Mrs. Eagar, and for a year or two years you may go on believing it. And I daresay that were it possible for Mrs. Eagar to fit into the general scheme of your life you would be completely happy with her. That I am not disputing. But she is not able to fit into that scheme. And my experience of the world has taught me that it is on the general scheme of life that happiness depends. A man is his work. A man who is not absorbed in his work, who is unproductive, loses his self-respect. That is what would happen to you if you were to go abroad. We take colour from our environment. You would be among people who were not working, who despised work, and you would cease to work. What work, after all, would there be for you to do? The Riviera is a pleasure ground. And when you came back to England what do you picture yourself as doing? You would be over thirty. And what use has any business for a man of that age without experience and without capital? Think how difficult a man retired from the East finds it. It would be difficult, and after one or two disappointments you would give up trying. One cannot idle with impunity for five years. You would develop into the most melancholy of all objects, the man about town who has no job. I may be wrong. But that is how my experience of the world tells me it will go. And I have to stand by my experience. Modern life is complex. We are made, each of us, to fit into our particular niche. And we can fit no other. You have been trained for one job. Anywhere else you would be useless. By making you an allowance I should be making it possible for you to become a drone. That I will never do.”

  He paused, and walking across laid his hand on his son’s shoulder.

  “My dear boy, you mustn’t, I beg of you, think that I am hard with you; that I am unsympathetic. I know what you are feeling. It would be much easier and much pleasanter for me to say, ‘Well, it’s a pity that it should be this way, but you must make what you wish of your own life. And we’ll turn your salary into an allowance.’ It would be much easier to do that. But I’ld never forgive myself afterwards if I did, nor I think would you forgive me. I know that these next months will be very difficult to bear. But I’m convinced that it’s the lesser of two evils that I’m recommending.”

  In silence and with bowed head James Merrick listened. It was not possible for him to feel any of the traditional anger and indignation of the son whose will has been crossed by parental prejudice. His father had been very gentle and very considerate, and from his own point of view extremely wise. From the worldly point of view Merrick knew that he was behaving idiotically. He was risking everything: his future, his position, his friends, his interests, his ambitions. One by one he placed them in the scales. A heavy load. But then, on the other side, was Marian: Marian, with her red-brown hair and her laughing eyes, her friendliness and gaiety and sweetness. Marian’s kisses. How speedily the scale went down!

  Wearily he rose to his feet.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “It isn’t any good. You’re right in a way, of course. But it’s not as though there was an alternative. I’ve got to go, and I’ve just got to make the best show I can out of it. I’ll make a better show than you expect probably. With a girl like Marian, you see, one just couldn’t go to bits; one couldn’t let oneself become something that she’ld not respect.”

  His mother looked at him fondly.

  “You must love her a very great deal,” she said.

  Mr. Merrick sniffed impatiently.

  “Love passes. He’s loved before.”

  James Merrick shrugged his shoulders.

  “Maybe,” he said. “But I’m not expecting to again.”

  §

  The moment he entered her room next day Marian Eagar realized that Merrick’s interview with his parents had been unsatisfactory.

  “What is it?” she asked anxiously. “Are they angry? Have things gone very wrong?”

  Merrick smiled reassuringly.

  “Not wrong enough to worry us,” he said. “Not for more than a very little while, at least. For that little, I’m afraid I shall have to be so ungallant as to ask you to support me. It’s like this, you see.”

  And seated on a cushion at her feet, his head rested against her knees, the palm of a hand held soft against his cheek, he explained to her the essence of his father’s objections. “He said that it would ruin my chances as a solicitor. And that he wouldn’t do anything to make that easy for me. But the world is pretty full of jobs.” He spoke confidently, and indeed the arguments that had seemed weighty enough on the previous evening dwindled into ridiculous proportions here with Marian at his side. It was so childish to imagine that they could ever be apart.

  “It’ll be a bit rotten for you at first,” he said. “We shall have to be fearfully economical; I feel pretty bad about letting you in for it. But it won’t be for long. I’ll find something to do all right. It’s only a question of waiting. And we can afford to wait, can’t we? We’re young enough.”

  She bent forward and kissed his hair. He could not see how thoughtful her eyes were nor how grave. Nor did he feel any need to wonder why the soft palm should have been pressed closer to his cheek.

  “Your father said that we might have five years to wait,” she said. “We hadn’t expected that. It’s a long time.”

  “It’ll pass quickly. We shall be together.”

  “What’ll you do, though? There isn’t much to do.”

  “I might farm.”

  Marian shook her head dubiously. She knew too well from her childhood’s wandering through the Riviera in what farming consisted for the majority of depaysés: a few months of feverish activity, followed by lassitude: the gradual extension of one’s acquaintance: an increased number of invitations: the forming of ties and habits that were hampered by farm duties: the eventual handing over of the property to peasants who swindled you. She knew the process. The excuse of work without the fact of work. No, no, she could not let him in for that.

  “And I suppose your father’s right,” she said, “about your finding it difficult to get into anything when you came back.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. If one tried hard enough…” he answered vaguely.

  Fondly, but critically, she looked down at him. She was six years younger than he was. And felt sixteen older. She loved him, but she was not blind to him. She saw him for what he was; a man who had been built for one purpose and could serve no other. He was one of those for whom the pleasant pastures of life are fore-ordained. He had started with the comfortable assurance of security. He had seen life from the start as an easy and simple thing. One had to work, but not over-hard, to pass exams. There was plenty of time for play. There was no need to take things seriously. One had to do just well enough. One had a fine time at school, a fine time at Oxford, and afterwards a fine time as a young man in London. Then gradually one grew tired of just amusement. One became conscious of obligations; one married, one had children, one wanted to do the best one could for them. In the late twenties one began to think seriously of things. And since happiness is a ripening sunshine, one’s nature had grown rich and mellow. One could bring breeding and decent feeling to that of all professions for which breeding and decent feeling were essential. That was how life had been meant to go for him. That was how life had been going for him.

  She knew what he had been on the n
ight when they had first met. She knew what he was becoming now: knew how he was wearying of, and finding unsatisfactory that life of parties and affaires that had seemed so infinitely desirable in the early twenties. He was tired of superficial and temporary relationships. He was prepared to take life seriously. Had they been free to marry, he and she, they would have made, she was very sure, a decent show of it. He would have been a lover and a husband and a friend. That though would have been inside his setting. And she asked herself with a heavy heart what they would be able to make of life outside. She knew so well that drifting European life of the depaysé: knew how it nourished and developed all that was shallow and indolent in human nature, sapping all that was worth while. It was a test to which one would hesitate to put the strongest character. And Jimmy… how immense a risk of ruining his life she would run were she to take it.

  With a sigh she released her hand from his, rose to her feet and walked over to the window.

  “We’ve had a bad deal,” she said.

  The tone in which she spoke, and the words she used, were so out of keeping with his own mood, in so complete a contrast from anything that he had expected of her, that at first he did not appreciate their import.

  “What do you mean?” he said. “I don’t understand.”

  Again she sighed.

  “A bad deal,” she repeated. “We could have had a sweet time together.”

  “But we’re going to have!”

  She shrugged her shoulders.

  “Your father’s right, my dear. It’s a question of choosing between two evils. And running away to Monte Carlo isn’t the frying-pan, it’s the fire.”

  He looked at her incredulously.

  “You mean…” he began, “you mean…”

  “I mean that your father’s right. It would be madness, criminal madness for us to go away.”

  “Then you don’t love me.”

  It was the only explanation that he could see. Marian was not the woman to put material considerations before loving; it was not because she had found she was to be less comfortable than she had expected, that she was refusing to come away with him. She did not love him. There could be no other explanation.