The Forsyte Saga(36)

‘Taste!’ cried June, flaring up at once; ‘I wouldn’t give that for his taste, or any of the family’s!’

Mrs Small was taken aback.

‘Your Uncle Swithin,’ she said, ‘always had beautiful taste! And Soames’s little house is lovely; you don’t mean to say you don’t think so!’

‘H’mph!’ said June, ‘that’s only because Irene’s there!’

Aunt Juley tried to say something pleasant:

‘And how will dear Irene like living in the country?’

June gazed at her intently, with a look in her eyes as if her conscience had suddenly leaped up into them; it passed; and an even more intent look took its place, as if she had stared that conscience out of countenance. She replied imperiously:

‘Of course she’ll like it; why shouldn’t she?’

Mrs Small grew nervous.

‘I didn’t know,’ she said, ‘I thought she mightn’t like to leave her friends. Your Uncle James says she doesn’t take enough interest in life. We think – I mean Timothy thinks – she ought to go out more. I expect you’ll miss her very much!’

June clasped her hands behind her neck.

‘I do wish,’ she cried, ‘Uncle Timothy wouldn’t talk about what doesn’t concern him!’

Aunt Juley rose to the full height of her tall figure.

‘He never talks about what doesn’t concern him,’ she said.

June was instantly compunctious; she ran to her aunt and kissed her.

‘I’m very sorry, Auntie; but I wish they’d let Irene alone.’

Aunt Juley, unable to think of anything further on the subject that would be suitable, was silent; she prepared for departure, hooking her black silk cape across her chest, and, taking up her green reticule:

‘And how is your dear grandfather?’ she asked in the hall. ‘I expect he’s very lonely now that all your time is taken up with Mr Bosinney.’ She bent and kissed her niece hungrily, and with little, mincing steps passed away.

The tears sprang up in June’s eyes; running into the little study, where Bosinney was sitting at the table drawing birds on the back of an envelope, she sank down by his side and cried:

‘Oh, Phil! it’s all so horrid!’ Her heart was as warm as the colour of her hair.

On the following Sunday morning, while Soames was shaving, a message was brought him to the effect that Mr Bosinney was below, and would be glad to see him. Opening the door into his wife’s room, he said:

‘Bosinney’s downstairs. Just go and entertain him while I finish shaving. I’ll be down in a minute. It’s about the plans, I expect.’

Irene looked at him, without reply, put the finishing touch to her dress and went downstairs.

He could not make her out about this house. She had said nothing against it, and, as far as Bosinney was concerned, seemed friendly enough.

From the window of his dressing-room he could see them talking together in the little court below.

He hurried on with his shaving, cutting his chin twice. He heard them laugh, and thought to himself: ‘Well, they get on all right, anyway!’

As he expected, Bosinney had come round to fetch him to look at the plans.

He took his hat and went over.

The plans were spread on the oak table in the architect’s room; and pale, imperturbable, inquiring, Soames bent over them for a long time without speaking.

He said at last in a puzzled voice:

‘It’s an odd sort of house!’

A rectangular house of two storeys was designed in a quadrangle round a covered-in court. This court, encircled by a gallery on the upper floor, was roofed with a glass roof, supported by eight columns running up from the ground.

It was indeed, to Forsyte eyes, an odd house.

‘There’s a lot of room cut to waste,’ pursued Soames.

Bosinney began to walk about, and Soames did not like the expression on his face.

‘The principle of this house,’ said the architect, ‘was that you should have room to breathe – like a gentleman!’

Soames extended his finger and thumb, as if measuring the extent of the distinction he should acquire, and replied:

‘Oh! yes; I see.’

The peculiar look came into Bosinney’s face which marked all his enthusiasms.

‘I’ve tried to plan a house here with some self-respect of its own. If you don’t like it, you’d better say so. It’s certainly the last thing to be considered – who wants self-respect in a house, when you can squeeze in an extra lavatory?’ He put his finger suddenly down on the left division of the centre oblong: ‘You can swing a cat here. This is for your pictures, divided from this court by curtains; draw them back and you’ll have a space of fifty-one by twenty-three six. This double-faced stove in the centre, here, looks one way towards the court, one way towards the picture room; this end wall is all window; you’ve a south-east light from that, a north light from the court. The rest of your pictures you can hang round the gallery upstairs, or in the other rooms. In architecture,’ he went on – and though looking at Soames he did not seem to see him, which gave Soames an unpleasant feeling – ‘as in life, you’ll get no self-respect without regularity. Fellows tell you that’s old-fashioned. It appears to be peculiar any way; it never occurs to us to embody the main principle of life in our buildings; we load our houses with decoration, gimcracks, corners, anything to distract the eye. On the contrary, the eye should rest; get your effects with a few strong lines. The whole thing is regularity – there’s no self-respect without it.’