Although with her infallible instinct Mrs. Small had said the very thing
to make her guest 'more intriguee than ever,' it is difficult to see how
else she could truthfully have spoken.
It was not a subject which the Forsytes could talk about even among
themselves--to use the word Soames had invented to characterize to
himself the situation, it was 'subterranean.'
Yet, within a week of Mrs. MacAnder's encounter in Richmond Park, to all
of them--save Timothy, from whom it was carefully kept--to James on his
domestic beat from the Poultry to Park Lane, to George the wild one,
on his daily adventure from the bow window at the Haversnake to the
billiard room at the 'Red Pottle,' was it known that 'those two' had
gone to extremes.
George (it was he who invented many of those striking expressions still
current in fashionable circles) voiced the sentiment more accurately
than any one when he said to his brother Eustace that 'the Buccaneer'
was 'going it'; he expected Soames was about 'fed up.'
It was felt that he must be, and yet, what could be done? He ought
perhaps to take steps; but to take steps would be deplorable.
Without an open scandal which they could not see their way to
recommending, it was difficult to see what steps could be taken. In this
impasse, the only thing was to say nothing to Soames, and nothing to
each other; in fact, to pass it over.
By displaying towards Irene a dignified coldness, some impression might
be made upon her; but she was seldom now to be seen, and there seemed
a slight difficulty in seeking her out on purpose to show her coldness.
Sometimes in the privacy of his bedroom James would reveal to Emily the
real suffering that his son's misfortune caused him.
"I can't tell," he would say; "it worries me out of my life. There'll
be a scandal, and that'll do him no good. I shan't say anything to him.
There might be nothing in it. What do you think? She's very artistic,
they tell me. What? Oh, you're a 'regular Juley! Well, I don't know; I
expect the worst. This is what comes of having no children. I knew how
it would be from the first. They never told me they didn't mean to have
any children--nobody tells me anything!"
On his knees by the side of the bed, his eyes open and fixed with worry,
he would breathe into the counterpane. Clad in his nightshirt, his neck
poked forward, his back rounded, he resembled some long white bird.
"Our Father-," he repeated, turning over and over again the thought of
this possible scandal.