The Forsyte Saga Volume 2(36)
‘What on earth’s that?’ she said.
The blood returned to Michael’s heart. Curious how he had dreaded its having anything to do with her!
‘Don’t know, darling; fell on my hat – must belong to heaven.’ And he batted it.
The balloon floated, dropped, bounded twice, wobbled and came to rest.
‘You are a baby, Michael. I believe you bought it.’
Michael came closer, and stood quite still.
‘My hat! What a misfortune to be in love!’
‘You think so!’
‘Il y a toujours un qui baise, et l’autre qui ne tend pas la joue.’
‘But I do.’
‘Fleur!’
Fleur smiled.
‘Baise away.’
Embracing her, Michael thought: ‘She holds me – does with me what she likes; I know nothing of her!’
And there arose a small sound – from Ting-a-ling smelling the balloon.
PART TWO
Chapter One
THE MARK FALLS
THE state of the world had been getting more and more on Soames’s nerves ever since the general meeting of the P.P.R.S. It had gone off with that fatuity long associated by him with such gatherings – a watertight rigmarole from the chairman; butter from two reliable shareholders; vinegar from shareholders not so reliable; and the usual ‘gup’ over the dividend. He had gone there glum, come away glummer. From a notion once taken into his head Soames parted more slowly than a cheese parts from its mites. Two-sevenths of foreign business, nearly all German! And the mark falling! It had begun to fall from the moment that he decided to support the dividend. And why? What was in the wind? Contrary to his custom, he had taken to sniffing closely the political columns of his paper. The French – he had always mistrusted them, especially since his second marriage – the French were going to play old Harry, if he was not greatly mistaken! Their papers, he noticed, never lost a chance of having a dab at English policy; seemed to think they could always call the tune for England to pipe to! And the mark and the franc, and every other sort of money, falling. And, though in Soames was that which rejoiced in the thought that one of his country’s bits of paper could buy a great quantity of other countries’ bits of paper, there was also that which felt the whole thing silly and unreal, with an ever-growing consciousness that the P.P.R.S. would pay no dividend next year. The P.P.R.S. was a big concern; no dividend would be a sign, no small one, of bad management. Assurance was one of the few things on God’s earth which could and should be conducted without real risk. But for that he would never have gone on the Board. And to find assurance had not been so conducted and that by himself, was – well! He had caused Winifred to sell, anyway, though the shares had already fallen slightly. ‘I thought it was such a good thing, Soames,’ she had said plaintively: ‘it’s rather a bore, losin’ money on these shares.’ He had answered without mercy: ‘If you don’t sell, you’ll lose more.’ And she had done it. If the Rogers and Nicholases who had followed him into it hadn’t sold too – well, it was their look out! He had made Winifred warn them. As for himself, he had nothing but his qualifying shares, and the missing of a dividend or two would not hurt one whose director’s fees more than compensated. It was not, therefore, private uneasiness so much as resentment at a state of things connected with foreigners and the slur on his infallibility.
Christmas had gone off quietly at Mapledurham. He abominated Christmas, and only observed it because his wife was French, and her national festival New Year’s Day. One could not go so far as to observe that, encouraging a foreign notion. But Christmas with no child about – he still remembered the holly and snapdragons of Park Lane in his own childhood – the family parties; and how disgusted he had been if he got anything symbolic – the thimble, or the ring – instead of the shilling. They had never gone in for Santa Claus at Park Lane, partly because they could see through the old gentleman, and partly because he was not at all a late thing. Emily, his mother, had seen to that. Yes; and, by the way, that William Gouldyng, Ingerer, had so stumped those fellows at the Heralds’ College, that Soames had dropped the inquiry – it was just encouraging them to spend his money for a sentimental satisfaction which did not materialize. That narrow-headed chap, ‘Old Mont’, peacocked about his ancestry; all the more reason for having no ancestry to peacock about. The Forsytes and the Goldings were good English country stock – that was what mattered. And if Fleur and her child, if one came, had French blood in them – well, he couldn’t help it now.