Some Do Not … - Ford Madox Ford (non fiction books to read TXT) 📗

I asked myself ‘Faith⁠ ⁠… Faith what!’ I couldn’t remember the name of my father’s head gardener.”

Sylvia, who was thinking of other things, asked:

“What was the name?”

Tietjens answered:

“I don’t know, I don’t know to this day.⁠ ⁠… The point is that when I knew that I didn’t know that name, I was as ignorant, as uninstructed, as a newborn babe and much more worried about it.⁠ ⁠… The Koran says⁠—I’ve got as far as K in my reading of the Encyclopædia Britannica every afternoon at Mrs. Wannop’s⁠—‘The strong man when smitten is smitten in his pride!’⁠ ⁠… Of course I got King’s Regs, and the M.M.L. and Infantry Field Training and all the A.C.I.s to date by heart very quickly. And that’s all a British officer is really encouraged to know⁠ ⁠…”

“Oh, Christopher!” Sylvia said. “You read that Encyclopædia; it’s pitiful. You used to despise it so.”

“That’s what’s meant by ‘smitten in his pride,’ ” Tietjens said. “Of course what I read or hear now I remember.⁠ ⁠… But I haven’t got to M, much less V. That was why I was worried about Metternich and the Congress of Vienna. I try to remember things on my own, but I haven’t yet done so. You see it’s as if a certain area of my brain had been wiped white. Occasionally one name suggests another. You noticed, when I got Metternich it suggested Castlereagh and Wellington⁠—and even other names.⁠ ⁠… But that’s what the Department of Statistics will get me on. When they fire me out. The real reason will be that I’ve served. But they’ll pretend it’s because I’ve no more general knowledge than is to be found in the Encyclopædia: or two-thirds or more or less⁠—according to the duration of the war.⁠ ⁠… Or, of course, the real reason will be that I won’t fake statistics to dish the French with. They asked me to, the other day, as a holiday task. And when I refused you should have seen their faces.”

“Have you really,” Sylvia asked, “lost two brothers in action?”

“Yes,” Tietjens answered. “Curly and Longshanks. You never saw them because they were always in India. And they weren’t noticeable⁠ ⁠…”

“Two!” Sylvia said. “I only wrote to your father about one called Edward. And your sister Caroline. In the same letter.⁠ ⁠…”

“Carrie wasn’t noticeable either,” Tietjens said. “She did Charity Organisation Society work.⁠ ⁠… But I remember: you didn’t like her. She was the born old maid⁠ ⁠…”

“Christopher!” Sylvia asked, “do you still think your mother died of a broken heart because I left you?”

Tietjens said:

“Good God; no. I never thought so and I don’t think so. I know she didn’t.”

“Then!” Sylvia exclaimed, “she died of a broken heart because I came back.⁠ ⁠… It’s no good protesting that you don’t think so. I remember your face when you opened the telegram at Lobscheid. Miss Wannop forwarded it from Rye. I remember the postmark. She was born to do me ill. The moment you got it I could see you thinking that you must conceal from me that you thought it was because of me she died. I could see you wondering if it wouldn’t be practicable to conceal from me that she was dead. You couldn’t, of course, do that because, you remember, we were to have gone to Wiesbaden and show ourselves; and we couldn’t do that because we should have to be in mourning. So you took me to Russia to get out of taking me to the funeral.”

“I took you to Russia,” Tietjens said, “I remember it all now⁠—because I had an order from Sir Robert Ingleby to assist the British Consul-General in preparing a Blue Book statistical table of the Government of Kiev.⁠ ⁠… It appeared to be the most industrially promising region in the world in those days. It isn’t now, naturally. I shall never see back a penny of the money I put into it. I thought I was clever in those days.⁠ ⁠… And of course, yes, the money was my mother’s settlement. It comes back⁠ ⁠… yes, of course⁠ ⁠…”

“Did you,” Sylvia asked, “get out of taking me to your mother’s funeral because you thought I should defile your mother’s corpse by my presence? Or because you were afraid that in the presence of your mother’s body you wouldn’t be able to conceal from me that you thought I killed her?⁠ ⁠… Don’t deny it. And don’t get out of it by saying that you can’t remember those days. You’re remembering now: that I killed your mother: that Miss Wannop sent the telegram⁠—why don’t you score it against her that she sent the news?⁠ ⁠… Or, good God, why don’t you score it against yourself, as the wrath of the Almighty, that your mother was dying while you and that girl were croodling over each other?⁠ ⁠… At Rye! Whilst I was at Lobscheid⁠ ⁠…”

Tietjens wiped his brow with his handkerchief.

“Well, let’s drop that,” Sylvia said. “God knows I’ve no right to put a spoke in that girl’s wheel or in yours. If you love each other you’ve a right to happiness and I daresay she’ll make you happy. I can’t divorce you, being a Catholic; but I won’t make it difficult for you other ways, and self-contained people like you and her will manage somehow. You’ll have learned the way from Macmaster and his mistress.⁠ ⁠… But, oh, Christopher Tietjens, have you ever considered how foully you’ve used me!”

Tietjens looked at her attentively, as if with magpie anguish.

“If,” Sylvia went on with her denunciation, “you had once in our lives said to me: ‘You whore! You bitch! You killed my mother. May you rot in hell for it⁠ ⁠…’ If you’d only once said something like it⁠ ⁠… about the child! About Perowne!⁠ ⁠… you might have done something to bring us together⁠ ⁠…”

Tietjens said:

“That’s, of course, true!”

“I know,” Sylvia said, “you can’t help it.⁠ ⁠… But when, in your famous county family pride⁠—though a youngest son!⁠—you say to yourself: And I daresay if⁠ ⁠… Oh, Christ!⁠ ⁠… you’re shot in the trenches you’ll say it⁠ ⁠… oh, between the saddle and the ground! that you never did a