Mr March regarded him with an expression that dubiously lightened; the frown of anger had become puzzled, and Mr March said, his voice more subdued than since he entered the room: ‘That was civil of him, anyway.’
He went on: ‘I don’t know what’s happening to the family. My generation weren’t a patch on my father’s. And as for yours, there’s not one of you who’ll get a couple of inches in the obituary column. My Uncle Henry said that just before he died in ’27, and all I could reply was “After all, you can say this for them. They don’t drink, and they don’t womanize.”’
Mr March spoke straight to Charles:
‘You might be the only chance of rescuing them from mediocrity. There’s always been a consensus of opinion that you wouldn’t disgrace yourself at the Bar. Ever since your preparatory schoolmaster said you had a legal head: though he was wrong in his prognostications about all your cousins. I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve the most unsatisfactory children in the whole family. First your sister made her regrettable marriage. Of her there’s nothing good to report. Then you choose to behave in this fashion. And neither you nor your sister Katherine have ever made any attempt to fit into the life of the people round you. You’ve always been utterly unsociable. You’ve never taken the part everyone wanted you to take. You’ve not had the slightest consideration for what the family thinks of me. You wouldn’t cross the road to keep me in good repute. I’ve been more criticized about my children than anyone in the family since 1902, the time Justin’s daughter married out of the faith. Justin had a worse time than anyone. He couldn’t bear to inspect the wedding presents. It was always rumoured that he sent some secretly himself to cover up a few of the gaps. Since Justin, no one has been disapproved of as I have.’
Mr March sat down, in an armchair close to one of the side tables. For a second, I thought the quarrel was over. Then Charles said: ‘I wish it weren’t so, for your sake.’
Charles had spoken simply and with feeling: in reply, Mr March flushed to a depth of anger he had not reached that night. He clutched at the arm of his chair as he leant forward; in doing so, he swept off an ashtray from the little table. The rug was shot with cigarette-stubs and match-ends. Charles bent to clear them.
‘Don’t pick them up,’ Mr March shouted. Charles replaced the ashtray, and put one or two stubs in it.
‘Don’t pick them up, I tell you,’ Mr March cried with such an increase of rage that Charles hesitated.
‘I refuse to have you perform duties for my sake. I refuse to listen to you expressing polite regrets for my sake. You appear to consider yourself completely separate from me in all respects. I am not prepared to tolerate that attitude.’
‘What do you mean?’ Charles’ voice had become angry and hard.
‘I am not prepared to tolerate your attitude that you can dissociate yourself from me in all your concerns. Even if I survive criticism from the family on your account, that isn’t to admit that you’ve separated yourself from me.’
‘I come to you for advice,’ said Charles.
‘Advice! You can go to the family lawyer for advice. Though I never knew why we’ve stood a fellow so long-winded as Morris for so long,’ cried Mr March. ‘I’m not prepared to be treated as a minor variety of family lawyer by my son. I shall have to consider taking actions that will make that clear.’
Charles broke out: ‘Do you imagine for a moment that you can coerce me back to the law?’
Mr March said: ‘I do not propose to let you abandon yourself to your own devices.’
Everyone was surprised by the calm, ambiguous answer and by Mr March’s expression. As Charles’ face darkened, Mr March looked almost placid. He seemed something like triumphant, from the instant he evoked an outburst as angry as his own. He went on quietly:
‘I want something for you. I wish I could know that you’ll get something that I’ve always wanted for you.’ He checked himself. Abruptly he broke off; be looked round at us as though there had been no disagreement whatever, and began an anecdote about a Friday night years before.
Part Two
Father and Son
8: The Cost of Help
For some time after the quarrel I did not get a clear account of Mr March’s behaviour. According to Katherine, he was so depressed that he stopped grumbling; he listened to criticisms from his brothers and sisters, but even these he did not pass on. Weeks went by before he began to greet Charles at meals with: ‘If you’re determined to persist in your misguided notions, what alternative proposal have you to offer?’ One afternoon, when I was in the drawing-room, Mr March burst in after his daily visit to the club and cried: ‘I’m being persecuted on account of my son’s fandango.’ That was all I heard directly. When I dined with them, there were times when he seemed melancholy, but his level of spirits was so high that I could not be sure. One day Charles mentioned to me that he thought Mr March had begun to worry about Katherine. I fancied that I could recall the signs.
As for Charles himself, none of his family had any idea what he was intending, or whether he was intending anything at all. He put on a front of cheerfulness and good temper in his father’s presence. His days had become as lazy as Katherine’s. He stayed in bed till midday, talked to her most afternoons, went dancing at night. Many of his acquaintances thought, just as he had predicted, that he was settling down to the life of a rich and idle young man.
They should have watched his manner as he set me going on my career.
By the early summer I still had had nothing like a serious case, and I was getting worn down with anxiety. Then Charles took charge of my affairs. He handled them with astuteness and nerve. He risked snubs, which he could not have done on his own behalf, and got me invited to the famous June party at the Holfords’. At the same time he approached Albert Hart and through him met the solicitors who sent Hart the majority of his work. One of them was glad to oblige Philip March’s nephew, and said he would like to meet me; another, one of the best-known Jewish solicitors in London, promised to be present at the Holfords’ party. There were other skeins, concealed from me, in Charles’ plans. They took up his entire attention. As he devoted himself to them, Charles was continuously angry with me.
A few minutes before the Holfords’ party, where he planned for me to make a good impression, there was an edge to his voice. I was sitting in his bedroom at Bryanston Square while he knotted his white tie in front of the mirror. I mentioned a story of Charles’ grandfather that Mr March had just told me — ‘he must have been a very able man,’ I said.
‘Obviously he must have been,’ said Charles. He was still looking into the mirror, smoothing down his thick, fair, wiry hair. ‘But he didn’t do so much after all. He was a rather successful banker. And acquired the position that a rather successful banker could in that period, if he happened to be a competent man. Don’t you agree?’
I was referring to Mr March’s account, but Charles interrupted: ‘Oh, I know he’d got some human qualities. The point is, he didn’t do so much. Look, don’t you admit those jobs he spent his life on are really pretty frivolous? I mean, the traditional jobs of my sort of people. The Stock Exchange and banking and amateur politics when you’ve made enough money. Can you imagine taking them up if you had a free choice?’
‘No,’ I said.
Charles turned round.
‘And if you had a free choice, can you imagine taking up the profession you’re anxious to be successful at?’
I did not answer.
‘You can’t imagine it. Don’t you admit that you can’t?’ Charles said, with an angry, contemptuous, sadic smile.