Mother and Son (8 page)

“There is no question of onslaught, with the pot in this state. Some fresh tea, Bates, and some more hot water. Was this tea made for two people, or was it meant to supply us all, as usual?”

“The latter I think, ma'am. I was present when Cook measured it. And she made no comment.”

“Well, it is better to be over than under-hospitable, Rosebery. Bring up your chair, Miss Wolsey, so that we can talk. Well, well, my son, that little effort hardly needed your help. Bring up your chair as well, into its place by mine. You shall soon have a cup of tea to your taste.”

“I hardly think I need any more, Mother. It seems I have already exceeded a normal allowance.”

“It does not matter whether one or both of you has done so. It is too small a point to pursue.”

“I suggest it was myself, Mother. I was protesting my inability to deal with the tea, and dealing with it in another way all the time,” said Rosebery, ending with a laugh.

“Oh, here is a beautiful sight!” said Hester, stooping
to caress a cat, that had accompanied Bates into the room. “Here is someone who makes me feel at home. He does just remind me of an important personage there.”

“So you have a cherished cat, Miss Wolsey?” said Julius feeling a word from him was due.

“I have a friend who happens to be a cat,” said Hester, looking into his face. “He was very upset by my leaving him. He had not given me permission.”

“No cat would be disturbed by a thing like that,” said Miranda. “How did this cat get into the drawing-room, Bates?”

“He followed me along the passage, ma'am. I had omitted to shut the door. He is always on the watch for an oversight.”

“What is his name?” said Hester.

“I am not quite sure,” said Miranda. “Has it a name, Bates?”

“We call him Tabbikin, ma'am.”

“But he is not a tabby,” said Hester.

“The name was suggestive of a cat, ma'am.”

“Is it a good mouser?” said Miranda.

“I believe Cook is satisfied, ma'am.”

“Oh, Tabbikin, fancy your being kept for your baser qualities! What would you say to the life my Plautus leads?”

Tabbikin went towards the fire, looked round to see if his presence would be tolerated, and turned and withdrew, as though disinclined for risk.

“Is he happy in the kitchen?” said Hester.

“I expect it is well cared for,” said Miranda. “It is there to be of use.”

“Does he eat the mice when he catches them?”

“No, it is too well fed. Unless that was our last cat.”

“He plays with them for a time, ma'am. He only infrequently eats them. He sometimes brings them to Cook.”

“Oh, my cat brought a bird to me the other day,” said Hester, simplifying the truth unconsciously. “It is sad that they have these propensities.”

“I fear, Miss Wolsey, that to my mother they are the justification for their existence,” said Rosebery, smiling.

“Oh, fancy keeping a cat for what he can do for you, and not for what he is! A cat's only obligation is to be himself.”

“A cat would never be anything else,” said Miranda. “We take advantage of its instincts.”

“We do not do that with Plautus. We like him to suppress them.”

“Perhaps our cat is really the more fortunate,” said Julius.

“But how much less fortunate you are yourselves!”

“You had a roundabout journey, Miss Wolsey, and a halting train.”

“Yes, I found myself feeling inclined to get out and walk.”

“That would not have helped you,” said Miranda. “What kind of household did you leave?”

“My friend with whom I share a home, our housekeeper and the cat. All of them equally important in their way.”

“Will your friend be able to keep up the house by herself?”

“She always bore the larger part of the expenses,” said Hester, keeping her eyes from Julius and speaking with open simplicity. “She was better off than I was. But now I can contribute so little that I should be in effect dependent on her. And that I could not be.”

“You are very wise. A plan like that could only have one end.”

“I do not see why, Mother,” said Rosebery. “Why should not Miss Wolsey make her contribution in the form of her presence?”

“If you need me to tell you, you have less knowledge of life than you should have at your age.”

“I daresay that is so. Knowledge of life has never been one of my ambitions. It seems to imply an acquaintance with things of which it is as well to be ignorant.”

“Why should it not include all things?” said Julius.

“That is not called knowledge of life, Uncle,” said Francis.

“Let us talk about the things that are called that,” said Alice.

“I told you to keep in the background,” said their aunt.

“But the lure is too strong for us,” said Francis. “We did not know that Miss Wolsey's affairs would hold such promise.”

“It seems too good to be true in a companion,” said Hester, smiling.

“Miss Wolsey's affairs are nothing to do with you,” said Miranda.

“Surely, Mother, that is hardly the case, now that she
is a member of our household,” said Rosebery. “They are a natural matter of interest to us all.”

“Well, go on probing into them. But I don't know what she will think of you.”

“Mother, it was you who asked the leading questions.”

“Ask me anything you like,” said Hester. “I have no dark secrets. My life is a simple, open thing.”

“Is your friend upset by your leaving her?” said Alice.

“Yes, I am afraid she is.”

“Then is she willing to support you?” said Adrian.

“Yes, that is what she wished to do.”

“Miss Wolsey, it is a great tribute to you,” said Rosebery.

“She might not continue in that mind,” said Miranda. “It is a thing it would be easy to get tired of.”

“Mother, the cynical touch is sure to come from you.”

“You can cultivate simplicity too far. There is no cynicism involved in an experience of human nature.”

“It is perhaps the second that produces the first,” said Julius.

“Well, Father, that is cynical.”

“Ah, Tabbikin, what do you think of it all? Are you a cynic or not?” said Hester, stooping and extending her hand.

“The cat is not here,” said Miranda. “You will not entice it out of its place, Miss Wolsey? We do not want it with us.”

“I may speak to him if I see him? I don't think I could pass him without a word.”

“I hardly think she could, when she cannot be apart from him without one,” said Alice to her brothers.

“He would pass you without a look,” said Julius.

“Well, why should he not? I am not nearly so worth looking at. His personality is so much more appealing than a human being's.”

“Do you really think a cat is more interesting than you are?” said Miranda.

“Oh, but yes. How can I compete with him in grace and charm?” said Hester, putting her hands together and just looking at the men. “And his dependence on himself, when I have always leant on other people! There is no comparison.”

“It is more sensible not to make one. We cannot impute human qualities to a beast. And a cat is a selfish creature.”

“Surely selfishness is a human quality.”

“Less marked in human beings than in cats.”

“Ah, Tabbikin,” said Hester, again extending a hand, “so you are more selfish than we are? Now can that be true?”

There was a pause.

“Miss Wolsey is so used to being with a cat, that she cannot accept any other conditions,” said Julius.

“And how can I be expected to?” said Hester, meeting his eyes. “Not have a cat to compensate for human awkwardness! What a waste of opportunity!”

“No one here is awkward,” said Miranda, “unless imputing the quality deserves the name. Yes, I shall talk in my own way, Julius. My age and my position place me apart. No one can be with me, who does not accept it.”

“And we are all with her, Miss Wolsey,” said Rosebery. “So you must gather what you may.”

“Well, I do not want you with me any longer. I wish to have an hour with Miss Wolsey alone. She did not undertake to be a general companion. And she will be more at her ease when you are all gone. She is used to being with women. You can go and help your father, my son. My having a companion was to set you free, and it can begin to do so. Now Miss Wolsey, draw up your chair and we will have a talk. Would you like some more fresh tea? Or would it be too much to have it a third time?”

“Yes, it would indeed. But it was good to have it twice, after a tedious journey.”

“The journey could only have taken an hour or two.”

“But it should only have taken twenty minutes. And the discrepancy gave the impression of tediousness. Ah, Tabbikin——” Hester straightened herself and looked aside.

“You can forget the cat. You will soon get used to being without one. And I daresay it will do you good. Now, settle down and be at your ease. It is not being so that makes you behave unnaturally. You are not used to men, and they make you aware of yourself. But you will not have much to do with them.”

“No, I am here to be with you,” said Hester, her look of open-eyed perplexity fading at the last words. “And I hope I shall be that constantly. It is the reason of my coming.”

“I am sorry you have lost your income,” said Miranda, in a sincere tone. “But I am fortunate to have someone who has had one, and so had what goes with it.
It will mean that we can associate on equal terms. It will make a better companionship.”

“If it was not on equal terms, it would not be one, would it?”

“Well, well, these things are as they have to be. And, while I think of it, will you show as much knowledge and experience as you can, when you talk to me, and not as little? I have no use for simplicity, assumed or otherwise. And when it is the first, nothing can be done for it.”

“I shall get to know just how far you like to go,” said Hester, in a cordial tone. “And of course I will adapt my standard to yours. It is only my duty.”

“You will have to do the best you can with my standard,” said Miranda, smiling. “And as we are talking in this way, there is something I should tell you. My son is a confirmed bachelor, and has nothing to give to any woman but his mother. It is due to any single woman, who is to be thrown with him, to explain that. You do not misunderstand me?”

“No, it is quite simple, isn't it?” said Hester, again with the perplexed look. “You only mean what you say. I am to know that your son has nothing to give me. And that is only fair, if things should be the same on both sides.”

“Well, you have nothing to give each other. So you will remember it, and he will not need to do so. It was right to warn you, as you are unaccustomed to men, and your instincts may be stronger than you realise.”

“I daresay they are,” said Hester, in a rueful manner. “They are bound up in the home I have left. I suppose
the home instinct is strong in any woman. And they say that my maternal instinct is expended on Plautus; and that may have its element of truth. And my instinct for human affection is fulfilled by my friend. So my instincts are fully occupied.”

“Your deepest instinct is not. But we need not go into that. You understand my warning. You would not be the person you are, if you did not. So we can pass to other subjects. Is your money irrevocably gone? I sympathise deeply with you about that.”

“It was in a single security that has ceased to pay. ‘Security' seems an ironic term. And I am afraid my instinct of possession is stronger than I knew. It surprises me how much I mind.”

“It is surely natural to mind. Is there any hope that the investment will recover?”

“I cherish the hope, and imagine myself restored to my home and my friend and my cat, with all my instincts satisfied. As it is, it is little wonder that they fix themselves upon Tabbikin.”

“Is your cat a very well-bred animal?” said Miranda.

“Oh, I do not know. He is not an animal to me. He is a complex and subtle personality. I hardly find any other more interesting.”

“You will learn to do so. I think you are already learning. Your life has not helped you to know men or women or yourself.”

“I think, if we did not do the last instinctively, we should never do it. There is another instinct with a duty to fulfil.”

“Some of us are misled by our conception of ourselves.
That is quite another thing. But we will not run these matters to their death. You would like to unpack and settle down. The housemaid will show you your room and give you any help you need, though perhaps you would hardly be dependent on it. We shall be having dinner in an hour.”

“I am indeed not dependent on it. That would not fit at all with my conception of myself. Not that it is a thing I ever think about. Do you think about yours?”

“I would recommend everyone to do so sometimes. It may need to be brought up to date. But you need not keep using my words again. You have enough of your own.”

“Well, I will go and unpack, while you bring yours up to the last minute,” said Hester, as if she did not hear the last words. “And I will leave mine alone, as is my habit.”

Miranda smiled to herself and took up the paper. She discussed public matters with her husband on equal terms. When the latter came in, he broached a personal one.

“Where is Miss Wolsey?”

“She has gone to her room. I do not keep her on a lead. You need not ask where she is, whenever you do not see her.”

“I wondered what had happened to her.”

“Why, what should happen?”

“Your talk might have been too much for her.”

“It was as much as she liked, but no more than she needed. I think she saw that, though she pretended
not to. She did her part rather well. She is not a stupid woman.”