‘Well, for goodness sake, try and remember that you’re a duchess again now,’ said Bobby, kissing his aunt good night.
13
The two children of Captain and Lady Brenda Chadlington took a tremendous fancy to Paul, and he, although in the first place had been completely put off by the fact that their names were Christopher Robin and Wendy, decided after a day or two that he would overlook this piece of affectation, which was, after all, not their own fault. He addressed them as George and Mabel (his lips refusing to utter their real names) and became very much attached to them.
‘You see, it’s not as though the poor things had chosen those names themselves,’ he said to Bobby, ‘and I should like to do what little I can to help them towards some form of self-respect. It is really tragic to see children surrounded by such an atmosphere of intellectual dishonesty. Poor George and Mabel.’
‘What d’you mean?’ asked Bobby, yawning. He was both bored and piqued, as Héloïse had gone off for the whole day with Squibby.
‘In every respect,’ went on Paul, ‘they are treated as congenital half-wits by their parents. It is really shocking. They tell me,’ he added disgustedly, ‘that their Sussex house is called “The Cottage in the Wood”. Well, I mean to say! I always refer to it as The Cedars when mentioning it to them. “The Cottage in the Wood” indeed; it’s nearly as good as “Mulberrie Farm”. I don’t know what the English-speaking race is coming to.’
‘Oh, of course, Brenda is the most affected woman in the world, we all know that, but she seems to be bringing them up quite nicely, I must say. They aren’t at all spoilt or naughty.’
‘They may not be. All I know is that their poor little minds are simply drowning in a welter of falsehood and pretence.’
‘I s’pose you mean,’ said Bobby, lighting a cigarette, ‘that they are made to say their prayers and discouraged from seeing Brenda and Charlie naked in the bath. Personally, I’m rather old-fashioned about these things, too.’
‘They are treated insanely. Not only are their brains being warped by constant application to the most sterile and insidiously unmoral forms of child literature – Barrie, A. A. Milne, Kenneth Grahame, Kipling, and so on – but they are being sternly repressed in every way. Just at this age when they should be opening out to life, assimilating new experiences of every sort, learning to care for truth and beauty in every form, they are subjected to constant humiliations, constant thwarting and hindering. Each little instinct has to be fought back as soon as it appears. How can they be expected to develop? Look at what happened to poor George on Christmas Day!’
‘I didn’t then and I should simply hate to now,’ said Bobby, wondering when was the soonest that he could expect Héloïse back from her outing.
‘Poor child, what could be more natural though? It was obviously the first time in his stunted little life that he had had the chance to eat as much chocolate as he really wanted. That incident told a tale of wanton cruelty.’
‘Wanton greediness, I should call it. Dirty little pig.’
‘As for Mabel, it is tragic to see the way she is chivvied about from pillar to post all day. “Have you washed your hands, Wendy? Did you clean your teeth? Take off your outdoor shoes. Get on with your knitting. Why haven’t you brushed your hair? Put on your coat. Go for a walk.” And all this, I would have you observe, to a child of inherently contemplative nature, a philosopher, probably, in the making. How can she develop properly? Every time she sits down to commune within herself, to think out some abstruse problem or to register some new experience, she is hounded off to perform dreary and perfunctory tasks. My heart bleeds for Mabel.’
‘Wendy’s the laziest little beast I know. She’d never do a thing if she were left to herself. It’s pure idleness with her.’
‘I entirely disagree with you, Bobby. That child has ideas and perceptions far beyond her age, and naturally they tire her out. She needs time and leisure in which to tabulate the impressions which she is always receiving from the outer world. Another thing very sad to see is the way her emotional life is threatened.’
‘How d’you mean?’
‘The poor child has a most distinct father-fixation, haven’t you realized that? Very marked indeed.’
‘Oh, nonsense, Paul; what extraordinary ideas you do have.’
‘Nonsense, is it? My dear Bobby, just you notice the way she copies him in everything – she sits, walks, eats and talks exactly like him. Why, in another year or two she’ll be the living image of him, always a sign of morbid affection, you know.’
‘Really, you do surprise me. I suppose heredity could have nothing to do with it?’ said Bobby sarcastically.
‘Oh, no, nothing whatever. Nobody believes in hereditary influences nowadays. No, it’s all the result of this mad passion she has, subconsciously, of course, for her father. Most dangerous.’
‘Well,’ said Bobby, ‘I expect you know best. Anyhow, here comes one of the little cherubs, bless his tiny heart.’
‘Mr Fisher,’ said Christopher Robin, putting his head round the schoolroom door. ‘Please will you come out with us? Mother says we must go up the drive and back before lunch.’
‘Must, must, always that word “must”,’ sighed Paul. ‘So unwholesome, so stifling. Yes, I’d like to come out with you, George. Where’s Mabel, then?’
‘She’s just looking for still-borns in The Times,’ said Christopher Robin. ‘I’ll fetch her – oh, here she comes though.’ Wendy Chadlington kept a little red pocket-book in which she wrote down the number of still-born babies every day as announced in the Births column of The Times. This lugubrious hobby seemed to afford her the deepest satisfaction. ‘Any
