Robert Garnett

“ Soon her emotion passed, and she looked around her with renewed excitement. “How lovely the blue sky and the blossom of the oleander!” The waiter was standing beside her setting out the coffee-pot and the milk jug, the cups and saucers, the two hot rolls, wrapped in napkins, and the four thin bricks of lustreless sugar. She picked up her husband’s letter and glanced at the envelope.
“How happy it will make Grandison to have a friendly letter from Richard!” ”

“ It was a mark of the old man's impersonality that, in spite of the interest he inspired, Garnett had never got beyond idly wondering who he might be, where he lived, and what his occupations were. He was presumably a bachelor--a man of family ties, however relaxed, though he might have been as often absent from home would not have been as regularly present in the same place--and there was about him a boundless desultoriness which renewed Garnett's conviction that there is no one on earth as idle as an American who is not busy. ”

“ The ancient garnets, from Etruscan and Byzantine remains, some of which are flat plates set in gold, or carved with mythological designs, were probably obtained from India or perhaps from the remarkable locality for large masses of garnet in German East Africa. Many are cut with the portraits of Sassanian kings with their characteristic pearl earrings. The East Indians carve small dishes out of a single garnet. ”

“ The stones occur in a trap rock, and are weathered out by its decomposition and gathered from gravels and beds of streams. They are of the rich red variety known as pyrope (q.v.) , or Bohemian garnet; it is generally valued as a gem-stone. Such are the so-called “Cape rubies,” of South Africa, found in considerable quantity in German East Africa, and the beautiful garnets known as the “Arizona rubies.” Garnets are so abundant in Bohemia as to constitute an important industry, employing some five hundred miners, an equal number of cutters and as many as three thousand dealers. ”

“ He stayed there so long and stood so still that a robin, recognizing a friend in him, came to perch on his shoulder.
“The resurrection of the flesh has come to pass,” Mr. Dunnock said aloud. “These ones [151] come to me and they commune with me; why does she alone delay?”
At last a cow lowing on the other side of the hedge, interrupted the clergyman’s reverie; he started slightly and coming to himself began to pull his beard with a gesture of despair, and the robin, who had been wondering if he could induce his wife to nest in it, flew off to a tombstone, disappointed. ”

“ Richard laughed at this outburst. “As pretty as a wagtail,” he mused, screwing up his eyes, and teasing her. “That is flying rather high, isn’t it?”
“I don’t see why a human being shouldn’t be as beautiful as a bird,” said Anne seriously, at which her companion laughed more than ever.
“Perhaps not,” he said. “Still you don’t really hope that anyone should ever say to you: ‘Miss Dunnock, you are as pretty as a hedge-sparrow.’ I, of course, with my long nose, am [119] rather like a snipe.” ”

“ Sotheby spoken of, Anne felt strangely embarrassed, and to turn the conversation she asked: “How is your mother? Will you tell her that I am back and that I shall come round to the shop to see her as soon as I can?”
“Mother is not in the shop now,” replied Rachel almost rudely.
They had reached the edge of the green, and the little girl stopped short, motionless and stubborn, by the little bridge.
“Mother is never in the shop now, nor am I. [241] Father is made the manager, and there is a man under him learning to take his place.”
“Is Richard here or in London?” Anne asked. ”

“ He appears to have been very liberal when it was suggested to him that his assistance would be of service, but it never occurred to him to offer a contribution towards any scientific or public undertaking, and though at the time of his death he is said to have had more money in the funds than any other person in the country, besides a balance of £50,000 on his current account at his bank, and various other property, he bequeathed none to scientific societies or similar institutions. ”

“ Sotheby. “But that was the only thing he had in common with his second cousin, Captain Purdue.”
“The Peck boy went in once, to rescue the two girls, but I should not have gone in at all. I don’t think I should go into a burning house even if you or Rachel were inside it. I’m sure if Ginette ... Grandison.... But it’s not a proof of love at all; some people will risk their lives to save a kitten.” He muttered something else, but the others could not catch it.
“I must be going,” said Anne, getting up. ”

“ She did not speak of her dress, but of course it will be a white one, and they will wear black worsted stockings and solid little hobnailed boots laced high up the leg.”
“Rachel doesn’t worry about her boots,” said Anne at once, and her thoughts flew back to Mr. Yockney, then she looked round the studio thinking that the rent was paid out of the grocer’s shop at home. “I think Rachel’s perfectly happy. I think all your family are,” she said.
“So they ought to be,” said Richard, laughing. “See what a good son I am. I give my father an object in life, which is more than any of you do. ”

“ Anne Dunnock remained at the breakfast table, for she had only just finished the kipper on her plate. “The labourers will not go to work in the fields on such a day as this,” she said to herself. “And not a woman will venture out except me, for women’s boots are generally leaky, and their skirts flap wet against their calves. With a frost like this there should be skating, but the snow will have spoilt the ice, even if it were swept.” ”

“ Richard would keep me in a fool’s paradise until my money is exhausted.”
Her train of thought was interrupted by the sound of footsteps, and she heard a voice calling her. It was Richard.
“I meant to ask you: if you are short of money, let me lend you ten pounds. You must have time to look about you.”
Anne stared at him in surprise. He was very white; out of breath with running and his words [191] came with an effort, but his tone was still one of exasperation. ”

“ Young men sobbed and knelt; a woman shrieked; people were elbowing the standers in the aisles and pushing forward to kneel in agonized happiness, and suddenly they were setting relentlessly on a bewildered Elmer Gantry, who had been betrayed into forgetting himself, into longing to be one with Judson Roberts. ”

“ But one day the door of the chamber was beaten down, and his old wife came in passionately upbraiding him.
“Sin-Woo,” she cried, “thou hast not the heart of a man! Thou wouldest be deathless, leaving me to die! I shall be laid in the grave, and thou wilt reign with another! Wherefore have I been true to thee, if not that our ashes might mingle at the last? Thou hoary sensualist!”
“Su-Ti,” said the Emperor, with feeling, “thou dost grievously misjudge me. I am no heartless sensualist, no butterfly sipper at the lips of beauty. ”

“ Then the Council appointed a set time of coming to the Tower to examine Father Garnett upon this advantage they had by cunning won of him out of his own words. There came thither to that end the Lord of Salisbury, the Lord of Suffolk, the Lord Northampton and others. How Father Garnett had been used in the meantime for his preparation to this business we cannot learn, but we have cause to think it was not so well at this time especially, as he out of his modesty was content to affirm of his usage in general, being asked the question at his arraignment. ”

“ The van was packed; the man was waiting, impatient of their conversation. Anne did not hesitate, but scrambled up on to the tail-board of the van and settled herself on the rolled-up mattress.
She was excited without knowing why, and suddenly, looking at Grandison perched beside her on the edge of the wash-hand-stand, she felt happy and secure.
“I want to explain,” he said suddenly, as though he were defending himself. “This is my [200] furniture. I am taking it away from the studio because I cannot live with Richard or with Ginette any longer. ”

“ She had filled in her postal order and had sealed up her letter; there was no reason to stay longer listening while Mrs. Day repeated the letters after him, and she went out, posted her letter, and turned homewards. Already her emotions about her advertisement had subsided, and [89] as she hurried under the storm-tossed elms her thoughts were occupied with the grocer’s son and his strange telegram.
“Je suis las de tes amourettes et de mon amour. Je consens. Ecris.” What did that mean? And who was the Grandison to whom it was addressed? ”

“ Dunnock held the tree upright and the creeper in place, his hands protected in Noah’s hedging gloves.
[107] “The bees are working in the willows,” he said. “Though it is still three weeks to Palm Sunday.”
Yet Anne had not abandoned her plan; it was only that the spring and the garden full of growing things had claimed her attention. But one morning she found a letter for her on the breakfast table, and as she opened it her heart sank, for she guessed that it was from a lady anxious to engage her as a companion. ”

“ There is a living going begging at Dry Coulter. A hundred and twenty pounds a year....”
The pigeons cooed through all the afternoon, the pear tree burst into flower over her head, and was filled with the hum of hundreds of bees working among the scarlet stamens, at intervals Anne spoke of her life, and every now and then Richard would interrupt her with questions about her father. ”

“ Mr. Sotheby had needed no encouragement, and went on speaking: “All these farmers hoard their money, and laugh at me for spending mine, but I always say that we are both in the right, for they haven’t sons like my Richard. What good is money to my wife and me?” he asked, but, without waiting for a reply, continued: “To him it means books, education, painting in the best studios, and the company of his equals, for he would not find his equals about here.”
“Yes, money means all that and more,” thought Anne, but aloud she said:
“Is Lorenzo a painter, then?”
“My son Richard? No, he is an artist. ”

“ Garnett looked after him with a musing smile. The two had exchanged views on life for two years without so much as knowing each other's names. Garnett was a newspaper correspondent whose work kept him mainly in London, but on his periodic visits to Paris he lodged in a dingy hotel of the Latin Quarter, the chief merit of which was its nearness to the cheap and excellent restaurant where the two Americans had made acquaintance. But Garnett's assiduity in frequenting the place arose, in the end, less from the excellence of the food than from the enjoyment of his old friend's conversation. ”

“ Richard.
[226] P.S. Ginette has got the job she meant for Anne, as a mannequin style anglais. She writes to me every day. Whose fault is that?
Anne crumpled the letter in her hand; she did not feel shame or anger as her husband had done; she had no irritation against the outside world but only pity. As she followed her husband to the stairs her mind was busy with plans for returning to England. She thought of her father, of the old grocer lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, and of Mrs. Sotheby.
“All the same, we were right to send Richard all those postcards ”

“ Garnet, such an insecure dwelling-place, such a transient phantasmagoria, is any plan of earthly happiness not based upon the principles of justice. Such, Garnet, is your edifice of enjoyment; for you will feel that death, which hangs over us all at all times, may at any moment summon you from its possession to place you at the bar of Eternal Justice, to answer for the sin of your soul. ”

“ The expectation of this matter touching Father Garnett was great in every place, and the conceits of men very diverse and their discourses different what would become of so notable a man, being so famous for learning and piety and modesty as that his very enemies could speak no other but much good of him, unless they would so apparently wrong their judgments by judging contrary to the sight of all men. ”

“ Sotheby’s words Anne started, all her shame came back to her suddenly, but she saw that she must answer. A lump came in her throat, and her mouth trembled as she said:
“No, neither father nor I had ever heard of Plough Monday. It was entirely my father’s fault: he is sometimes impatient when he is disturbed reading.” ”

“ In order to be near the scene of action, Garnett went to breakfast at his usual haunt, determined to despatch his business as early in the day as politeness allowed. The head waiter welcomed him to a table near that of the transatlantic sage, who sat in his customary corner, his head tilted back against the blistered mirror at an angle suggesting that in a freer civilization his feet would have sought the same level. ”

“ Richard laughed and Anne added at once: “Oh, I went with your father and mother and Rachel to see the new cottages, and the site for the hotel.”
“What hotel?” asked Richard, but while Anne was explaining she did not notice the look of anxiety on his face, for she was too much taken up with looking out of the taxi window. Soon she was asking questions: “What is that [171] building? that street? that monument?” and was astonished that neither Richard nor his friend could tell her. She would have liked to spend hours driving about Paris, feeling Mr. ”

“ As the night drew on she would become bored, and drag young Sotheby after her to a vast hotel in Paris where they could dance all night. The men in their starched shirtfronts would turn pale, and wilt in the small hours of the morning under the tropical palms, but La Grandison would dance on and on, ruthlessly, first with one man and then with another. Richard Sotheby would be forgotten, a young man from the Peruvian Embassy would escort her home, while Richard, disconsolate and brokenhearted, would be left to pay for the buckets of iced champagne, and the mounds of uneaten sandwiches.... ”