‘Oh! sometime.’
‘Yes, we’ll fix something up. Good-bye, my dear! Good-bye, Jon! Tell Val I’m very glad.’ And, with a farewell nod, she led the way. Of a sort of rage in her heart she gave no sign, preparing normality for her father’s eyes.
Soames, indeed, was in the car. Excitement over the Gold Cup – so contrary to his principles – had caused him to sit down in the stand. And there he had remained during the next two races, idly watching the throng below, and the horses going down fast and coming back faster. There, quietly, in the isolation suited to his spirit, he could, if not enjoy, at least browse on a scene strikingly unf amiliar to him. The national pastime – he knew that everybody had ‘a bit on’ something nowadays. For one person who ever went racing there were twenty –it seemed – who didn’t, and yet knew at least enough to lose their money. You couldn’t buy a paper, or have your hair cut, without being conscious of that. All over London, and the South, the Midlands and the North, in all classes, they were at it, supporting horses with their bobs and dollars and sovereigns. Most of them – he believed – had never seen a race – horse in their lives – hardly a horse of any sort; racing was a sort of religion, he supposed, and now that they were going to tax it, an orthodox religion. Some primeval nonconformity in the blood of Soames shuddered a little. He had no sympathy, of course, with those leather-lunged chaps down there under their queer hats, and their umbrellas, but the feeling that they were now made free of heaven – or at least of that synonym of heaven the modern state – ruffled him. It was almost as if England were facing realities at last – Very dangerous! They would be licensing prostitution next! To tax what were called vices was to admit that they were part of human nature. And though, like a Forsyte, he had long known them to be so, to admit it was, he felt, too French. To acknowledge the limitations of human nature was a sort of defeatism; when you once began that, you didn’t know where you’d stop. Still, from all he could see, the tax would bring in a pretty penny – and pennies were badly needed; so, he didn’t know, he wasn’t sure. He wouldn’t have done it himself, but he wasn’t prepared to turn out the Government for having done it. They had recognized, too, no doubt, as he did, that gambling was the greatest make-weight there was against revolution; so long as a man could bet he had always a chance of getting something for nothing, and that desire was the real driving force behind any attempt to turn things upside down. Besides you had to move with the times uphill or downhill, and it was difficult to tell one from the other. The great thing was to avoid extremes.
From this measured reflection he was abruptly transferred to feelings unmeasured. Fleur and that young fellow were walking across there down to the rails! From under the brim of his grey hat he watched them painfully, reluctantly admitting that they made as pretty a couple as any there. They came to a stand on the rails – not talking; and to Soames, who, when moved, was exceptionally taciturn, this seemed a bad sign. Were things really going wrong, then – was passion forming within its still cocoon to fly on butterfly things for its brief hour? What was going on within the silence of those two? The horses were passing now; and the grey, they said, was his own nephew’s? Why did the fellow have horses? He had known how it would be when Fleur said he was going to Ascot. He regretted now having come. No, he didn’t! Better to know what there was to be known. In the press of people to the rails he could no longer see more than the young man’s grey hat, and the black-and–white covering of his daughter’s head. For a minute the race diverted him: might as well see Val’s horse well beaten. They said he thought a lot of it; and Soames thought the less of its chance for that. Here they came, all in a bunch – thundering great troop, and that grey – a handy colour, you couldn’t miss it. Why, he was winning! Hang it – he had won!
‘H’m!’ he said aloud: ‘that’s my nephew’s horse!’
Since nobody replied, he hoped they hadn’t heard. And back went his eyes to those two on the rails. Yes, they were coming away silently – Fleur a little in front. Perhaps – perhaps, after all, they didn’t get on, now! Must hope for the best. By George, but he felt tired! He would go to the car, and wait.
And there in the dusk of it he was sitting when they came, full of bubble and squeak – something very little-headed about people when they’d won money. For they had all won money, it seemed!
‘And you didn’t back him, Uncle Soames?’