“Oh, taxes!” said Laura contemptuously. “Never mind; even if it’s a little less, I can get along on it.”
“You know nothing of business, Lolly. I need not enter into explanations with you. It should be enough for me to say that for the last year your income has been practically nonexistent.”
“But I can still cash cheques.”
“I have placed a sum at the bank to your credit.”
Laura had grown rather pale too. Her eyes shone.
“I’m afraid you must enter into explanations with me, Henry. After all, it is my income, and I have a right to know what has happened to it.”
“Your capital has always been in my hands, Lolly, and I have administered it as I thought fit.”
“Go on,” said Laura.
“In I transferred the greater part of it to the Ethiopian Development Syndicate, a perfectly sound investment which will in time be as good as ever, if not better. Unfortunately, owing to this Government and all this socialistic talk the soundest investments have been badly hit. The Ethiopian Development Syndicate is one of them.”
“Go on, Henry. I have understood quite well so far. You have administered all my money into something that doesn’t pay. Now explain why you did this.”
“I had every reason for thinking that I should be able to sell out at a profit almost immediately. During November the shares had gone up from 5¾ to 8½. I bought in December at 8½. They went to 8¾ and since then have steadily sunk. They now stand at 4. Of course, my dear, you needn’t be alarmed. They will rise again the moment we have a Conservative Government, and that, thank Heaven, must come soon. But you see at present it is out of the question for you to think of leaving us.”
“But don’t these Ethiopians have dividends?” “These,” said Henry with dignity, “are not the kind of shares that pay dividends. They are—that is to say, they were, and of course will be again—a sound speculative investment. But at present they pay no dividends worth mentioning. Now, Lolly, don’t become agitated. I assure you that it is all perfectly all right. But you must give up this idea of the country. Anyhow, I’m sure you wouldn’t find it suit you. You are rheumatic—”
Laura tried to interpose.
“—or will be. All the Willoweses are rheumatic. Buckinghamshire is damp. Those poetical beechwoods make it so. You see, trees draw rain. It is one of the principles of afforestation. The trees—that is to say, the rain—”
Laura stamped her foot with impatience. “Have done with your trumpery red herrings!” she cried.
She had never lost her temper like this before. It was a glorious sensation.
“Henry!” She could feel her voice crackle round his ears. “You say you bought those shares at eight and something, and that they are now four. So if you sell out now you will get rather less than half what you gave for them.”
“Yes,” said Henry. Surely if Lolly were business woman enough to grasp that so clearly, she would in time see reason on other matters.
“Very well. You will sell them immediately—”
“Lolly!”
“—and reinvest the money in something quite unspeculative and unsound, like War Loan, that will pay a proper dividend. I shall still have enough to manage on. I shan’t be as comfortable as I thought I should be. I shan’t be able to afford the little house that I hoped for, nor the donkey. But I shan’t mind much. It will matter very little to me when I’m there.”
She stopped. She had forgotten Henry, and the unpleasant things she meant to say to him. She had come to the edge of the wood, and felt its cool breath in her face. It did not matter about the donkey, nor the house, nor the darkening orchard even. If she were not to pick fruit from her own trees, there were common herbs and berries in plenty for her, growing wherever she chose to wander. It is best as one grows older to strip oneself of possessions, to shed oneself downward like a tree, to be almost wholly earth before one dies.
As she left the room she turned and looked at Henry. Such was her mood, she could have blessed him solemnly, as before an eternal departure. But he was sitting with his back to her, and did not look round. When she had gone he took out his handkerchief and wiped his forehead.
Ten days later Laura arrived at Great Mop. After the interview with Henry she encountered no more opposition. Caroline knew better than to persist against an obstinacy which had worsted her husband, and the other members of the family, their surprise being evaporated, were indifferent. Titus was a little taken aback when he found that his aunt’s romantic proposals were seriously intended. He for his part was going to Corsica. “A banal mountainous spot,” he said politely, “compared with Buckinghamshire.”
The day of Laura’s arrival was wet and blusterous. She drove in a car from Wickendon. The car lurched and rattled, and the wind slapped the rain against the windows; Laura could scarcely see the rising undulations of the landscape. When the car drew up before her new home, she stood for a moment looking up the village street, but the prospect was intercepted by the umbrella under which Mrs. Leak hastened to conduct her to the porch. So had it rained, and so had the wind blown, on the day when she had come on her visit of inspection and had taken rooms in Mrs. Leak’s cottage. So, Henry and Caroline and their friends had assured her, did it rain and blow all through the winter in the Chilterns. No words of theirs, they said, could describe how dismal and bleak it would be among those unsheltered hills. To Laura, sitting by the fire in her parlour, the sound of wind and rain was pleasant. “Weather like this,” she thought, “would never be allowed in London.”
The unchastened gusts that
