The situation which at this stage might seem, and especially to Forsyte eyes, strange--not to say 'impossible'--was, in view of certain facts, not so strange after all. Some things had been lost sight of. And first, in the security bred of many harmless marriages, it had been forgotten that Love is no hot-house flower, but a wild plant, born of a wet night, born of an hour of sunshine; sprung from wild seed, blown along the road by a wild wind. A wild plant that, when it blooms by chance within the hedge of our gardens, we call
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a flower; and when it blooms outside we call a weed; but, flower or weed, whose scent and colour are always, wild! And further--the facts and figures of their own lives being against the perception of this truth--it was not generally recognised by Forsytes that, where, this wild plant springs, men and women are but moths around the pale, flame-like blossom.
It was long since young Jolyon's escapade--there was danger of a tradition again arising that people in their position never cross the hedge to pluck that flower; that one could reckon on having love, like measles, once in due season, and getting over it comfortably for all time--as with measles, on a soothing mixture of butter and honey--in the arms of wedlock.
Of all those whom this strange rumour about Bosinney and Mrs. Soames reached, James was the most affected. He had long forgotten how he had hovered, lanky and pale, in side whiskers of chestnut hue, round Emily, in the days of his own courtship. He had long forgotten the small house in the purlieus of Mayfair, where he had spent the early days of his married life, or rather, he had
long forgotten the early days, not the small house,--a Forsyte never forgot a house--he had afterwards sold it at a clear profit of
four hundred pounds.
He had long forgotten those days, with their hopes and fears and doubts about the prudence of the match (for Emily, though pretty, had nothing, and he himself at that time was making a bare thousand a year), and that strange, irresistible attraction which had drawn him on, till he felt he must die if he could not marry the girl with the fair hair, looped so neatly back, the fair arms emerging from a skin-tight bodice, the fair form decorously shielded by a cage of really stupendous circumference.
James had passed through the fire, but he had passed also through the river of years which washes out the fire; he had experienced the saddest experience of all--forgetfulness of what it was like to be in love.
Forgotten! Forgotten so long, that he had forgotten even that he had forgotten.
And now this rumour had come upon him, this rumour about his son's wife; very vague, a shadow dodging among the palpable, straightforward appearances of things, unreal, unintelligible as a ghost, but carrying with it, like a ghost, inexplicable terror.
He tried to bring it home to his mind, but it was no more use than trying to apply to himself one of those tragedies he read of daily in his evening paper. He simply could not. There could be nothing in it. It was all their nonsense. She didn't get on with Soames as well as she might, but she was a good little thing--a good little thing!
Like the not inconsiderable majority of men, James relished a nice little bit of scandal, and would say, in a matter-of-fact tone, licking
his lips, "Yes, yes--she and young Dyson; they tell me they're living at Monte Carlo!"
But the significance of an affair of this sort--of its past, its present, or its future--had never struck him. What it meant, what torture and raptures had gone to its construction, what slow, overmastering fate had lurked within the facts, very naked, sometimes sor-did, but generally spicy, presented to his gaze. He was not in the habit of blaming, praising, drawing deductions, or generalizing at all about such things; he simply listened rather greedily, and repeated what he was told, finding considerable benefit from the practice, as from the consumption of a sherry and bitters before a meal.
Now, however, that such a thing--or rather the rumour, the breath of it--had come near him personally, he felt as in a fog, which filled his mouth full of a bad, thick flavour, and made it difficult to draw breath.
A scandal! A possible scandal!
To repeat this word to himself thus was the only way in which he could focus or make it thinkable. He had forgotten the sensations necessary for understanding the progress, fate, or meaning of any such business; he simply could no longer grasp the possibilities of people running any risk for the sake of passion.
Amongst all those persons of his acquaintance, who went into the City day after day and did their business there, whatever it was, and in their leisure moments bought shares, and houses, and ate dinners, and played games, as he was told, it would have seemed to him ridiculous to suppose that there were any who would run risks for the sake of anything so recondite, so figurative, as passion.
Passion! He seemed, indeed, to have heard of it, and rules such as 'A young man and a young woman ought never to be trusted together' were fixed in his mind as the parallels of latitude are fixed on a map (for all Forsytes, when it comes to 'bedrock' matters of fact, have quite a fine taste in realism); but as to anything else--well, he could only appreciate it at all through the catch-word
'scandal.'
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Ah! but there was no truth in it--could not be. He was not afraid; she was really a good little thing. But there it was when you got a thing like that into your mind. And James was of a nervous temperament--one of those men whom things will not leave alone, who suffer tortures from anticipation and indecision. For fear of letting something slip that he might otherwise secure, he was physically unable to make up his mind until absolutely certain that, by not making it up, he would suffer loss.
In life, however, there were many occasions when the business of making up his mind did not even rest with himself, and this was
one of them.
What could he do? Talk it over with Soames? That would only make matters worse. And, after all, there was nothing in it, he felt
sure.
It was all that house. He had mistrusted the idea from the first. What did Soames want to go into the country for? And, if he must go spending a lot of money building himself a house, why not have a first-rate man, instead of this young Bosinney, whom nobody knew anything about? He had told them how it would be. And he had heard that the house was costing Soames a pretty penny beyond what he had reckoned on spending.
This fact, more than any other, brought home to James the real danger of the situation. It was always like this with these 'artistic'
chaps; a sensible man should have nothing to say to them. He had warned Irene, too. And see what had come of it!
And it suddenly sprang into James's mind that he ought to go and see for himself. In the midst of that fog of uneasiness in which his mind was enveloped the notion that he could go and look at the house afforded him inexplicable satisfaction. It may have been simply the decision to do something--more possibly the fact that he was going to look at a house--that gave him relief. He felt that in staring at an edifice of bricks and mortar, of wood and stone, built by the suspected man himself, he would be looking into the heart of that rumour about Irene.
Without saying a word, therefore, to anyone, he took a hansom to the station and proceeded by train to Robin Hill; thence--there being no 'flies,' in accordance with the custom of the neighbourhood--he found himself obliged to walk.
He started slowly up the hill, his angular knees and high shoulders bent complainingly, his eyes fixed on his feet, yet, neat for all that, in his high hat and his frock-coat, on which was the speckless gloss imparted by perfect superintendence. Emily saw to that; that is, she did not, of course, see to it--people of good position not seeing to each other's buttons, and Emily was of good position--but she saw that the butler saw to it.
He had to ask his way three times; on each occasion he repeated the directions given him, got the man to repeat them, then repeated
them a second time, for he was naturally of a talkative disposition, and one could not be too careful in a new neighbourhood.
He kept assuring them that it was a new house he was looking for; it was only, however, when he was shown the roof through the