Smothering the words: ‘Thank God!’ Compson Grice reached out his hand. But Wilfrid had leaned back and veiled his face in the smoke of his cigar. His publisher moved forward on to the edge of his chair.
“You mean that you want me to send a letter to the Daily Phase to say that The Leopard is practically your own experience?”
“Yes.”
“My dear fellow, I think it’s wonderful of you. That is courage, if you like.”
The smile on Wilfrid’s face caused Compson Grice to sit back, swallow the words: “The effect on the sales will be enormous,” and substitute:
“It will strengthen your position enormously. But I wish we could get back on that fellow.”
“Let him stew!”
“Quite!” said Compson Grice. He was by no means anxious to be embroiled, and have all his authors slated in the important Daily Phase.
Wilfrid rose. “Thanks very much. I must be going.”
Compson Grice watched him leave, his head high and his step slow. ‘Poor devil!’ he thought. ‘It IS a scoop!’
Back in his office, he spent some time finding a line in Colthan’s review which he could isolate from its context and use as advertisement. He finally extracted this: “Daily Phase: ‘No poem in recent years has had such power’” (the remaining words of the sentence he omitted because they were ‘to cut the ground from under the feet of all we stand for’). He then composed a letter to the editor. He was writing—he said—at the request of Mr. Desert, who, far from needing any challenge to come into the open, was only too anxious that everyone should know that The Leopard was indeed founded on his personal experience. For his own part—he went on– he considered that this frank avowal was a more striking instance of courage than could be met with in a long day’s march. He was proud to have been privileged to publish a poem which, in psychological content, quality of workmanship, and direct human interest, was by far the most striking of this generation.
He signed himself “Your obedient servant, Compson Grice.” He then increased the size of the order for the second edition, directed that the words “First edition exhausted; second large impression,” should be ready for use immediately, and went to his club to play bridge.
His club was the Polyglot, and in the hall he ran on Michael. The hair of his erstwhile colleague in the publishing world was ruffled, the ears stood out from his head, and he spoke at once:
“Grice, what are you doing about that young brute Coltham?”
Compson Grice smiled blandly and replied:
“Don’t worry! I showed the review to Desert, and he told me to draw its sting by complete avowal.”
“Good God!”
“Why? Didn’t you know?”
“Yes, I knew, but—”
These words were balm to the ears of Compson Grice, who had been visited by misgiving as to the truth of Wilfrid’s admission. Would a man really publish that poem if it were his own case; could he really want it known? But this was conclusive: Mont had been Desert’s discoverer and closest friend.
“So I’ve written to the Phase and dealt with it.”
“Did Wilfrid tell you to do that?”
“He did.”
“To publish that poem was crazy. ‘Quem deus—’” He suddenly caught sight of the expression on Compson Grice’s face. “Yes,” he added, bitterly, “you think you’ve got a scoop!”
Compson Grice said coldly:
“Whether it will do us harm or good remains to be seen.”
“Bosh!” said Michael. “Everybody will read the thing now, blast them! Have you seen Wilfrid today?”
“He lunched with me.”
“How’s he looking?”
Tempted to say ‘Like Asrael!’ Compson Grice substituted: “Oh! all right—quite calm.”
“Calm as hell! Look here, Grice! If you don’t stand by him and help him all you can through this, I’ll never speak to you again.”
“My dear fellow,” said Compson Grice, with some dignity, “what do you suppose?” And, straightening his waistcoat, he passed into the card room.
Michael, muttering, “Cold-blooded fish!” hurried in the direction of Cork Street. ‘I wonder if the old chap would like to see me,’ he thought.
But at the very mouth of the street he recoiled and made for Mount Street instead. He was informed that both his father and mother were out, but that Miss Dinny had come up that morning from Condaford.
“All right, Blore. If she’s in I’ll find her.”
He went up and opened the drawing-room door quietly. In the alcove, under the cage of her aunt’s parakeet, Dinny was sitting perfectly still and upright, like a little girl at a lesson, with her hands crossed on her lap and her eyes fixed on space. She did not see him till his hand was on her shoulder.
“Penny!”
“How does one learn not to commit murder, Michael?”
“Ah! Poisonous young brute! Have your people seen The Phase?”
Dinny nodded.
“What was the reaction?”
“Silence, pinched lips.”
Michael nodded.
“Poor dear! So you came up?”
“Yes, I’m going to the theatre with Wilfrid.”
“Give him my love, and tell him that if he wants to see me I’ll come at any moment. Oh! and, Dinny, try to make him feel that we admire him for spilling the milk.”
Dinny looked up, and he was moved by the expression on her face.
“It wasn’t all pride that made him, Michael. There’s something egging him on, and I’m afraid of it. Deep down he isn’t sure that it wasn’t just cowardice that made him renounce. I know he can’t get that thought out of his mind. He feels he’s got to prove, not to others so much as to himself, that he isn’t a coward. Oh! I know he isn’t. But so long as he hasn’t proved it to himself and everybody, I don’t know what he might do.”
Michael nodded. From his one interview with Wilfrid he had formed something of the same impression.
“Did you know that he’s told his publisher to make a public admission?”
“Oh!” said Dinny blankly. “What then?”
Michael shrugged.
“Michael, will anyone grasp the situation Wilfrid was in?”
“The imaginative type is rare. I don’t pretend I can grasp it. Can you?”
“Only because it happened to Wilfrid.”
Michael gripped her arm.
“I’m glad you’ve got the old-fashioned complaint, Dinny, not just this modern ‘physiological urge.’”
CHAPTER 20
While Dinny was dressing her aunt came to her room.
“Your uncle read me that article, Dinny. I wonder!”
“What do you wonder, Aunt Em?”
“I knew a Coltham—but he died.”
“This one will probably die, too.”
“Where do you get your boned bodies, Dinny? So restful.”
“Harridge’s.”
“Your uncle says he ought to resign from his club.”
“Wilfrid doesn’t care two straws about his club; he probably hasn’t been in a dozen times. But I don’t think he’ll resign.”
“Better make him.”
“I should never dream of ‘making’ him do anything.”
“So awkward when they use black balls.”
“Auntie, dear, could I come to the glass?”
Lady Mont crossed the room and took up the slim volume from the bedside table.
“The Leopard! But he did change them, Dinny.”
“He did not, Auntie; he had no spots to change.”
“Baptism and that.”
“If baptism really meant anything, it would be an outrage on children till they knew what it was about.”
“Dinny!”
“I mean it. One doesn’t commit people to things entirely without their consent; it isn’t decent. By the time Wilfrid could think at all he had no religion.”
“It wasn’t the givin’ up, then, it was the takin’ on.”
“He knows that.”
“Well,” said Lady Mont, turning towards the door, “I think it served that Arab right; so intrudin’! If you want a latch-key, ask Blore.”
Dinny finished dressing quickly and ran downstairs. Blore was in the dining-room.
“Aunt Em says I may have a key, Blore, and I want a taxi, please.”
Having telephoned to the cab-stand and produced a key, the butler said: “What with her ladyship speaking her thoughts out loud, miss, I’m obliged to know, and I was saying to Sir Lawrence this morning: ‘If Miss Dinny could take him off just now, on a tour of the Scotch Highlands where they don’t see the papers, it would save a lot of vexation.’ In these days, miss, as you’ll have noticed, one thing comes on the top of another, and people haven’t the memories they had. You’ll excuse my mentioning it.”