It may have been natural, but it was not what Philip meant. He repeated
“I wanted to make something…”
His mind’s eye saw an unformed mass of liquescent mud. He looked around, like a baited bear, and saw the flaming de Morgan lustre bowl on the mantelshelf. He opened his mouth to comment on the glaze and decided against it.
Tom said “Won’t you show us your drawings?” He said to his mother “He used to show the lady students, they liked them, they gave him bread…”
Philip undid his satchel and brought out his sketch-book. There was the Candlestick with its coiling dragons and poised, wide-eyed little men. Sketch after sketch, all the intricacies of the writhing and biting and stabbing. Tom said
“That’s the little man I liked, the elderly one with the thin hair and the sad look.”
Prosper Cain turned the pages. Stone angels, Korean gold ornaments for a crown, a Palissy dish in all its ruggedness, one of the two definitely authentic specimens.
“What are these?” he asked, turning more pages.
“Those are just my own ideas.”
“For what?”
“Well, I thought salt-glazed stoneware. Or mebbe earthenware, that page. I were drawing the metal to get the feel of it. I don’t know metal. I know clay. I know a bit about clay.”
“You have a fine eye,” said Prosper Cain. “A very fine eye. You were using the Collection as it is intended to be used, to study design.”
Tom drew a sigh of relief. The story was to have a good ending.
“Would you like to study in the Art School?”
“I dunno. I want to make something…”
He was suddenly at the end of his resources, and began to sway. Prosper Cain was still studying the drawings, and said, without looking up,
“You must be hungry. Ring for Rosie, Julian, and tell her to bring fresh tea.”
“I am always hungry,” said Philip, suddenly loudly, with twice the force of his earlier remarks. He had not meant it to be funny, but because he was truly about to be fed, they all took it as a joke, and laughed merrily together.
“Sit down, boy. This isn’t an interrogation.”
Philip looked doubtfully at the flame and peacock silk cushions.
“They’ll clean. You look all in.
• • •
Rosie, the parlourmaid, made several journeys up the narrow stairs, bringing trays with porcelain cups and saucers, a cakestand with a solid block of fruitcake, a platter of various kinds of sandwich, delicately designed both to appeal to a lady and to nourish growing boys (cucumber slivers in some, wedges of potted meat in others). Then she brought a dish of tartlets, a teapot, a teakettle, a cream jug. She was a wiry small person in starched cap and apron, about as old as Philip and Julian. She set everything out on occasional tables, put the kettle on the hearth, bobbed at Major Cain and went downstairs again. Prosper Cain asked Mrs. Wellwood to pour. He was amused to see Philip raise his cup to his eye to study the shepherdesses on flowered meadows around it.
“Minton porcelain, Sevres-style,” Prosper said. “An abomination in the eyes of William Morris, but I have a weakness for ornament…”
Philip put the cup down on the table at his elbow, and did not answer. His mouth was full of sandwich. He was trying to eat daintily, and he was
“And now?” said Prosper Cain. “What shall we do with this young man? Where shall he sleep tonight, and what should he do with himself?”
Tom was put in mind of David Copperfield’s arrival at Betsey Trot-wood’s house. A boy. Coming to a real home, out of dirt and danger. He was about to echo Mr. Dick—give him a bath—and managed not to. It would have been most insulting.
Olive Wellwood turned the question to Philip
“What do you
“Work,” said Philip. It was an easy answer and it was largely right.
“Not to go back?”
“No.”
“I think—if Major Cain agrees—you should come home now, with me and Tom, for the weekend. I imagine he has no thought of prosecuting you for trespass. This weekend is Midsummer Eve, and we are having a midsummer party at our house in the country. We are a large family, and friendly, and one more or less makes no difference.” She turned to Prosper Cain.
“And I hope that you too will come over to Andreden from Iwade, for midsummer magic, and bring Julian, and Florence too, to join the young folk.”