‘Or the Catholic church,’ she thought, ‘and I don’t believe in either.’
She opened the window, and leaned against its frame. A fly buzzed at her; she blew it away, and it instantly came back. Flies! They fulfilled a purpose. What purpose? While they were alive they were alive; when they were dead they were dead. ‘But not half-alive,’ she thought. She blew again, and this time the fly did not come back.
Fleur’s voice behind her said:
‘Isn’t it cold enough for you in here, my dear? Did you ever know such a year? I say that every May. Come and have tea. Clare’s in her bath, and very nice she looks, with a cup of tea in one hand and cigarette in the other. I suppose they’ll get to the end tomorrow?’
‘Your cousin says so.’
‘He’s coming to dinner. Luckily his wife’s at Droitwich.’
‘Why “luckily”?’
‘Oh! well, she’s a wife. If there’s anything he wants to say to Clare, I shall send him up to her; she’ll be out of her bath by then. But he can say it to you just as well. How do you think Clare will do in the box?’
‘Can anyone do well in the box?’
‘My father said I did, but he was partial; and the Coroner complimented you, didn’t he, at the Ferse inquest?’
‘There was no cross-examination. Clare’s not patient, Fleur.’
‘Tell her to count five before she answers, and lift her eyebrows. The thing is to get Brough rattled.’
‘His voice would madden me,’ said Dinny, ‘and he has a way of pausing as if he had all day before him.’
‘Yes, quite a common trick. The whole thing’s extraordinarily like the Inquisition. What do you think of Clare’s counsel?’
‘I should hate him if I were on the other side.’
‘Then he’s good. Well, Dinny, what’s the moral of all this?’
‘Don’t marry.’
‘Bit sweeping, till we can grow babies in bottles. Hasn’t it ever struck you that civilization’s built on the maternal instinct?’
‘I thought it was built on agriculture.’
‘By “civilization” I meant everything that isn’t just force.’
Dinny looked at her cynical and often flippant cousin, who stood so poised and trim and well-manicured before her, and she felt ashamed. Fleur said, unexpectedly:
‘You’re rather a darling.’
Dinner, Clare having it in bed and the only guest being ‘very young’ Roger, was decidedly vocal. Starting with an account of how his family felt about taxation, ‘very young’ Roger waxed amusing. His Uncle Thomas Forsyte, it appeared, had gone to live in Jersey, and returned indignantly when Jersey began to talk about taxation of its own. He had then written to The Times under the nom de guerre of ‘Individualist’, sold all his investments, and reinvested them in tax-free securities, which brought him in slightly less revenue than he had been receiving net from his taxed securities. He had voted for the Nationalists at the last election, and, since this new budget, was looking out for a party that he could conscientiously vote for at the next election. He was living at Bournemouth.
‘Extremely well-preserved,’ concluded ‘very young’ Roger. ‘Do you know anything about bees, Fleur?’
‘I once sat on one.’
‘Do you, Miss Cherrell?’
‘We keep them.’
‘If you were me, would you go in for them?’
‘Where do you live?’
‘A little beyond Hatfield. There are some quite nice clover crops round. Bees appeal to me in theory. They feed on other people’s flowers and clover; and if you find a swarm you can stick to it. What are the drawbacks?’
‘Well, if they swarm on other people’s ground, ten to one you lose them; and you have to feed them all the winter. Otherwise it’s only a question of time, trouble, and stings.’
‘I don’t know that I should mind that,’ murmured ‘very young’ Roger; ‘my wife would take them on.’ He cocked his eye slightly: ‘She has rheumatism. Apic acid, they say, is the best cure.’
‘Better make sure first,’ murmured Dinny, ‘that they’ll sting her. You can’t get bees to sting people they like.’
‘You can always sit on them,’ murmured Fleur.
‘Seriously,’ said ‘very young’ Roger, ‘half-a-dozen stings would be well worth it, poor thing.’
‘What made you take up law, Forsyte?’ struck in Michael.
‘Well, I got a “blighty” one in the war and had to get something sedentary. I rather like it, you know, in a way, and in a way I think it’s –’