She remembered the General’s loud, candid voice, so reminiscent of his son’s, calling out from the end of the long table that Jack ‘had not a groat to bless himself with- never would have - all the Aubreys were unlucky with money - they had to be lucky in marriage’. She remembered the endless pause after dinner, with the little boy poking holes in the fire-?screen: the concentrated urgency with which she willed the General to have done with his bottle, to come in, drink his tea and go away before her mother’s return, now long overdue. She remembered how she and the laughing Mrs Aubrey had supported him into the carriage - the interminable farewells - the General recalling some endless anecdote about a fox-?chase and losing himself in it while the child played havoc with the flowerbeds, shrieking like a barn-?owl Then ten minutes later, while she was still shattered, her mother’s return, the scene, the cries, tears, swooning, bed, extreme pallor,
reproaches Stephen I say, Stephen, I ain’t interrupting you, am I?’ said Jack, coming out of his room with a letter in his hand ‘Here’s a damned thing. Here’s Sophie writing me the damnedest rigmarole I can’t show it you - some very private things in it, you understand me - but the drift of it is, that if I choose to feel myself free, nothing would make her happier Free to do what, in God’s name God damn and blast my eyes, we are engaged to be married, ain’t we? If it were any other woman on earth, I should think there was some other man hanging about. What the devil can she mean by it? Can you make head or tail of it?’
‘It may be that someone has fabricated - it may be that someone has told her that you have come to India to see Diana Villiers,’ said Stephen, hiding his face with shame as he spoke. This was a direct attempt at keeping them apart, for his own purposes - partly for his own purposes. It was wholly uncandid, of course, and he had never been uncandid with Jack before. It filled him with anger; but still he went on, ‘or that you may see her here.’
‘Did she know Diana was in Bombay?’ cried Jack.
‘Sure it was common knowledge in England.’
‘So Mother Williams knew?’
Stephen nodded.
‘Ah, that is Sophie, from clue to earing,’ cried Jack, with such a radiant smile. ‘Can you imagine a sweeter thing to say? And such modesty, do you see? As if anyone could look at Diana after - however,’ he said, recollecting himself and looking deprecatingly at Stephen, ‘I don’t mean to say anything wrong, or uncivil. But not a reproach, not an unkind word in the whole letter - Lord, Stephen, how I love that girl.’ His bright blue eyes clouded, ran over, and he wiped them with his sleeve. ‘Never a hint of being ill-?used, though I know damned well what kind of life that woman leads her: to say nothing of filling her mind with ugly tales. A shocking life - you know Cecilia and Frankie are gone off, married? - that makes it even worse. Lord, how I shall press on with the refitting! Even faster now. I long to get back into the Atlantic or the Med: these are not waters where a man can look for any distinction now, far less any wealth. If only we had picked up a single decent prize off the Isle of France, I should write to her to come out to Madeira, and be damned to . . . A few hundred would buy us a neat cottage. How I should love a neat cottage, Stephen - potatoes, cabbages, and things.’
‘Upon my word, I cannot tell why you do not write, prize or no prize. You have your pay, for all love.’
‘Oh, that would not be right, you know. I am nearly clear of debt, but there is still a couple of thousand to find. It would scarcely be honourable to pay it off with her fortune, and then only have seven shillings a day to offer her.’
‘Do you pretend to teach me the difference between honourable and dishonourable conduct?’
‘No, no, of course not - pray don’t fly out at me, Stephen. I have spoke awkward again. No, what I mean is, it would not be right for me, do you understand? I could not bear it, to have Mrs Williams call me a fortune-?hunter. It is different in Ireland, I know - oh damn it, I am laid by the lee again - I do not mean you are a fortune-?hunter, but you see it differently in your country. Autre pays, autre merde. But in any case, she has sworn never to marry without her mother’s consent: so that claps a stopper over all.’
‘Never in life, my dear. If Sophie comes to Madeira Mrs Williams will be bound either to give her consent or to face a delighted neighbourhood. She was obliged to the same course in the case of Cecilia, I believe.’
‘Would not that be rather Jesuitical, Stephen?’ said Jack, looking into his face.
‘Not at all. Consent unreasonably withheld may justifiably be compelled. I am concerned with Sophie’s happiness and yours, rather than with pandering to Mrs Williams’s sordid whims. You must write that letter, Jack; for you are to consider, Sophie is the beauty of the world; whereas although you are tolerably well-?looking in your honest tarpaulin way, you are rather old and likely to grow older; too fat, and likely to grow even fatter - nay, obese.’ Jack looked at his belly and shook his head. ‘Horribly knocked about, earless, scarred: brother, you are no Adonis. Do not be wounded,’ he said, laying his hand on Aubrey’s knee, ‘when I say you are no Adonis.’
‘I never thought I was,’ said Jack.
‘Nor when I add that you are no Fox either: no flashing wit to counterbalance want of looks, wealth, grace and youth.’
‘Sure I never set up for a wit,’ said Jack. ‘Though I can bring out a good thing on occasion, given time.’
‘And Sophie, I say again, has real beauty: and there are Adonises, witty, moneyed Adonises, in England. Again, she is led a devil of a life. Two younger sisters have married: you are aware of the importance of marriage to a young woman - the status, the escape, the certified guarantee of not having failed, the virtual certainty of a genteel subsistence. You are a great way off, ten thousand miles and more: you may be knocked on the head from one moment to the next, and at no time is there more than a two-?inch plank between you and the grave. You are half the world away from her and yet within half a mile of Diana. She knows little or nothing of the world, little or nothing of men apart from what her mother tells her -small good, you may be sure. Lastly, there is her high sense of duty. Now although Sophie carries humanity to a high pitch of perfection, no young woman more, still she is human and she is affected by human considerations. I do not say for a moment that she coldly weighs them up; but considerations, the pressures, are there, and they are very strong. You must certainly write your letter, Jack. Take pen and ink.’
Jack gazed at him for a while with a heavy, troubled countenance, then stood up, sighed, pulled in his belly, and said, ‘I must go down to the yard: we are shipping the new capstan this evening. Thank you for what you have told me, Stephen.’
It was Stephen who took pen and ink and sat down to his diary. ‘I must go down to the yard, said he: we are stepping the new capstan this evening. Had there been powder-?smoke in the room, a tangible enemy at hand, there would have been none of this hesitation, no long stare: he would have known his mind and he would have acted at once, with intelligent deliberation. But now he is at a stand. With that odious freedom I prattled on: in doing so I overcame my shame; but it was bitter cruel and sharp while it lasted. In the instant between his asking, could I make head or tail of it? and my reply, the Devil said to me, “If Aubrey is really vexed with Miss Williams, he will turn to Diana Villiers again. You already have your work cut out with Mr Canning.” I fell at once. Yet already I
