jack’s club was not the kind of place that Stephen would have joined of his own accord, but Diana had made a point of it; she had made many of her friends as well as Jack support his candidature, and he had been a member for some time now.
‘Good morning, sir,’ said the hall porter. ‘I have some letters for you, and a uniform-case.’
‘Thank you,’ said Stephen, taking the letters. The
only one of consequence was on top and he broke the seal as he walked up the stairs. It began
Why should a foolish marriage vow,
Which long ago was made,
Oblige us to each other now,
When passion is decayed?
Between this and the last paragraph came a close-packed section, much underlined and not clearly legible in this light. The lines of the last paragraph were spaced wider; it was written more calmly and with a different pen, and it said ‘Your best uniform came just after you had left,
so rather than leave it at the Grapes, where the mice and moths swarm prodigiously in spite of all good Mrs Broad can do, I shall send it to the club. And Stephen, I do beg you will remember to put on a warm flannel undershirt and drawers when you are in England: you will find some on top of the uniform and some underneath it.’
These words he had absorbed before he reached the landing. He put the letter into his pocket, walked into the empty library, and looked through the others. One was a request for a loan by return of messenger; there were two invitations to dinners long since digested, and two communications about the Manx shearwater. He read them attentively and then returned to Diana’s letter: he must have known, she said, that when he paraded his redheaded lady up and down the Mediterranean, without the least disguise, she would resent it as an open, direct insult. She did not speak of the moral side of things – that was not her style and anyway prating about morality could safely be left to others – but she must own that she had never expected Stephen to do so ill-bred a thing; or having done it in a fit of folly, not to justify himself, at least by a story that she could decently pretend to believe. Here Stephen looked sharply for the date of the letter: there was none. Any woman of spirit would resent it. Even Lady Nelson,
a far, far meeker woman than Diana, had resented it, although there had been the decent veil of Sir William. She was obliged to confess that with all Stephen’s faults she had never, never expected him to behave like a scrub. She knew very well that ordinary men did so when passion was decayed, but she had never looked upon Stephen as an ordinary man.
She would never, never forget his kindness to her, and no amount of resentment would do away with her friendship; yet she was glad, yes so glad, that they had never been married in a Christian or a Roman Catholic church. Then, clearly after a pause and with this second pen, but he was never to think unkindly of her: and after that the postscript about the shirts.
He would no more have thought unkindly of her than he would of a falcon that had flown free, imagining some injury – he had known very proud, high-tempered falcons, passionately attached and passionately offended – but he was wounded to the heart, and he grieved. At first with a generalized grief that included his own desolate loss, so intensely that he clasped his hands and rocked to and fro, then more particularly for her.
He had known her a great while, but of all the wild flings, of all the coups de tête he had seen her make, this was the most disastrous. She had run off with Jagiello, a Lithuanian officer in the Swedish service who had long and quite openly admired her. But Jagiello was an ass: a tall, beautiful, golden-haired ass, adored by young women and liked by men for his cheerful candour and simplicity, but a hopelessly volatile ass, incapable of resisting temptation and perpetually surrounded by it, being rich as well as absurdly handsome. He was much younger than Diana; and constancy was not to be looked for. Marriage was impossible, because whatever she might suppose the ceremony Stephen and Diana had passed through aboard HMS Oedipus was legally binding. An active social life was as necessary to her as meat and drink, and he had no reason to suppose that Swedish society would be particularly kind to an
unmarried foreign woman whose only protector was a young and foolish Hussar. The thought of her fate in five years or even less made his heart sick. All he could find by way of light in all this darkness was the reflexion that at least she was independent: she did not have to rely on any man’s generosity. Yet even this was not certain: at one time she had had great quantities of money, but whether she had invested enough of it to be assured of a reasonable income for the rest of her life he did not know. It was probable, however, since she had a most capable adviser in her friend the banker Nathan, a man whom Stephen also liked. ‘I shall ask Nathan,’ he said; and moving in his chair he felt the rim of that damned brass box against his hip. It was strapped to his side by a long surgical bandage – before now he had left compromising, confidential papers in the pocket of a coach – and he must deal with it at once.
He reflected. The cold process of thought was a precious relief after all this turmoil of feeling, of passionate inward ejaculations, barely coherent protests against the injustice of it all, and repetitions of her name: he stood up, walked over to a desk and wrote Dr Maturin presents his compliments, and would be happy to wait on Sir Joseph Blaine as soon as it may be convenient. He was surprised to find his hand so unsteady that the words were scarcely to be read. He copied it out again with particular care and carried it
down to be delivered not to the Admiralty but to Sir Joseph’s private house in Shepherd Market.
‘Why, Stephen, there you are,’ cried Jack, walking in at this point. ‘How glad I am to see you. Ain’t it a damned thing about the poor dear old Grapes? But at least no one was hurt.
Come upstairs: I have something very important to tell you.’
‘Have any of the cases been decided?’ asked Stephen.
‘No, no, it is not that. Nothing has stirred in the legal way. This is quite different – you will be amazed.’
The library was still empty. Stephen, sitting with his
back to the window, watched the play of expression on Jack’s face, turned full to the light and alive with pleasure at the thought of making his friend’s fortune. ‘But the point is,’ said Jack in conclusion, ‘that the investments have to be made within the next few days. That is why I was so very glad to run into you just now. I was on the point of going round to Half-Moon Street to bring you this list, in case you might have been there.’
A message for Dr Maturin came in on a salver. ‘Forgive me, Jack,’ said Stephen. Turning to the window, he read that Sir Joseph would be more than happy to see Dr Maturin at any time after half past six o’clock; and turning back into the room he saw Jack looking at him with great concern.
‘Are you taken poorly, Stephen?’ he asked. ‘Sit down and let me fetch you a glass of brandy.’
‘Listen, Jack,’ said Stephen, ‘Diana has gone off to live in Sweden.’ There was an embarrassed silence. Jack at once saw that Jagiello was concerned but he could not in decency seem to understand and there appeared to be no remark he could possibly offer.
Stephen went on, ‘She thought Laura Fielding was my mistress, and that publicly parading her up and down the Mediterranean was a deliberate or at least a callous affront. Tell me, did it have that appearance? Did I seem to be Laura’s lover?’
‘I believe people generally thought – it looked rather as though. . .’
‘And yet I explained it as fully as I could,’ said Stephen, almost to himself. He stared at the clock, but although the hands were clear enough he could not make out the time: his mind was wholly taken up with the question Did she go before or after Wray brought her my letter? That is a point I must determine. ‘What’s o’clock?’ he asked.
‘Half past five,’ said Jack.
‘I shall not catch him at the Admiralty,’ reflected Stephen. ‘I shall call at his house, so. It is quite near Nathan’s. I shall have time for both if I hurry.’ He said