Obliged by Annette to have one--a Rollhard with pearl-grey cushions, electric light, little mirrors, trays for the ashes of cigarettes, flower vases--all smelling of petrol and stephanotis--he regarded it much as he used to regard his brother-in-law, Montague Dartie. The thing typified all that was fast, insecure, and subcutaneously oily in modern life. As modern life became faster, looser, younger, Soames was becoming older, slower, tighter, more and more in thought and language like his father James before him. He was almost aware of it himself. Pace and progress pleased him less and less; there was an ostentation, too, about a car which he considered provocative in the prevailing mood of Labour. On one occasion that fellow Sims had driven over the only vested interest of a working man. Soames had not forgotten the behaviour of its master, when not many people would have stopped to put up with it. He had been sorry for the dog, and quite prepared to take its part against the car, if that ruffian hadn't been so outrageous. With four hours fast becoming five, and still no Fleur, all the old car-wise feelings he had experienced in person and by proxy balled within him, and sinking sensations troubled the pit of his stomach. At seven he telephoned to Winifred by trunk call. No! Fleur had not been to Green Street. Then where was she? Visions of his beloved daughter rolled up in her pretty frills, all blood and dust-stained, in some hideous catastrophe, began to haunt him. He went to her room and spied among her things.
She had taken nothing--no dressing-case, no Jewellery. And this, a relief in one sense, increased his fears of an accident. Terrible to be helpless when his loved one was missing, especially when he couldn't bear fuss or publicity of any kind! What should he do if she were not back by nightfall?
At a quarter to eight he heard the car. A great weight lifted from off his heart; he hurried down. She was getting out--pale and tired-looking, but nothing wrong. He met her in the hall.
"You've frightened me. Where have you been?""To Robin Hill. I'm sorry, dear. I had to go; I'll tell you afterward." And, with a flying kiss, she ran up-stairs.
Soames waited in the drawing-room. To Robin Hill! What did that portend?
It was not a subject they could discuss at dinner--consecrated to the susceptibilities of the butler. The agony of nerves Soames had been through, the relief he felt at her safety, softened his power to condemn what she had done, or resist what she was going to do; he waited in a relaxed stupor for her revelation. Life was a queer business. There he was at sixty-five and no more in command of things than if he had not spent forty years in building up security-always something one couldn't get on terms with! In the pocket of his dinner-jacket was a letter from Annette. She was coming back in a fortnight. He knew nothing of what she had been doing out there.
And he was glad that he did not. Her absence had been a relief. Out of sight was out of mind! And now she was coming back. Another worry! And the Bolderby Old Crome was gone--Dumetrius had got it--all because that anonymous letter had put it out of his thoughts. He furtively remarked the strained look on his daughter's face, as if she too were gazing at a picture that she couldn't buy. He almost wished the War back. Worries didn't seem, then, quite so worrying.
>From the caress in her voice, the look on her face, he became certain that she wanted something from him, uncertain whether it would be wise of him to give it her. He pushed his savoury away uneaten, and even joined her in a cigarette.
After dinner she set the electric piano-player going. And he augured the worst when she sat down on a cushion footstool at his knee, and put her hand on his.
"Darling, be nice to me. I had to see Jon--he wrote to me. He's going to try what he can do with his mother. But I've been thinking.
It's really in your hands, Father. If you'd persuade her that it doesn't mean renewing the past in any way! That I shall stay yours, and Jon will stay hers; that you need never see him or her, and she need never see you or me! Only you could persuade her, dear, because only you could promise. One can't promise for other people. Surely it wouldn't be too awkward for you to see her just this once now that Jon's father is dead?""Too awkward?" Soames repeated. "The whole thing's preposterous.""You know," said Fleur, without looking up, "you wouldn't mind seeing her, really."Soames was silent. Her words had expressed a truth too deep for him to admit. She slipped her fingers between his own--hot, slim, eager, they clung there. This child of his would corkscrew her way into a brick wall!
"What am I to do if you won't, Father?" she said very softly.
"I'll do anything for your happiness," said Soanies; "but this isn't for your happiness.""Oh! it is; it is!""It'll only stir things up," he said grimly.
"But they are stirred up. The thing is to quiet them. To make her feel that this is just our lives, and has nothing to do with yours or hers. You can do it, Father, I know you can.""You know a great deal, then," was Soames' glum answer.
"If you will, Jon and I will wait a year--two years if you like.""It seems to me," murmured Soames, "that you care nothing about what I feel."Fleur pressed his hand against her cheek.
"I do, darling. But you wouldn't like me to be awfully miserable."How she wheedled to get her ends! And trying with all his might to think she really cared for him--he was not sure--not sure. All she cared for was this boy! Why should he help her to get this boy, who was killing her affection for himself? Why should he? By the laws of the Forsytes it was foolish! There was nothing to be had out of it--nothing! To give her to that boy! To pass her into the enemy's camp, under the influence of the woman who had injured him so deeply!