menu_book Chapter 9

part two chapter four of if winter comes by a s m hutchinson this librivox recording is in the public domain recording by kirk he strolled in he wore a well-made suit of dark grey flannel brown brogue shoes and a soft collar with a black tie tied in a sailor's knot he disliked clerical dress and he rarely wore it he was dark his good-looking face bore habitually a rather sulky expression as though he were a little bored or dissatisfied you would never have thought to look at him that he was a clergyman or as he would have said a priest and in not thinking that you would have paid him the compliment that pleased him most this is not because mr boom bagshaw lacked earnestness in his calling he was enormously in earnest but because he disliked and despised the conventional habits and manners and the appearance of the clergy and in any case intensely disliked being one of a class

for the same reasons he wore a monocle not because the vision of his right eye was defective but because no clergyman wears a monocle it is not done by the priesthood and that is why the rev cyril boom bagshaw did it he strolled negligently into the morning-room his hands in his trousers pockets the skirt of his jacket rumpled on his wrists he gave the impression of having been strolling about the house all day and now strolling in here for want of a better room to stroll into he nodded negligently to sabre hullo sabre he smiled negligently at mabel and seated himself negligently on the edge of the table still with his hands in his pockets he swung one leg negligently and negligently remarked good morning mrs sabre sabre had the immediate and convinced feeling that the negligent and reverend gentleman was not in his house but that he was permitted to be in the house of the negligent and reverend gentleman and this was the feeling that the negligent and reverend gentleman invariably gave to his hosts whoever they might be likewise to his congregations indeed it was said by a profane person that deity entered mr boom bagshaw's church on the same terms and accepted them

as he sat negligently swinging his leg he frequently strained his chin upwards and outwards rather as if his collar were too tight but it was neatly loose or as if he were performing an exercise for stretching the muscles of his neck this was a habit of his a silver entry-dish was placed before mabel and another before sabre lojinks removed her mistress's cover and mr boom bagshaw pushed aside a flour vase to obtain a view i don't eat salmon he remarked the base was now between him and sabre he again moved it or cutlets mabel exclaimed oh dear now i've got this salmon in specially from tidborough i'll have some of that ham said mr boom bagshaw and he rose sulkily and strolled to the sideboard where he rather sulkily cut from a ham in thick wedges the house was clearly his house he addressed himself to mabel now in a very few weeks you'll no longer have to get things from tidborough mrs sabre salmon or anything else the shops in the market square are going the minute they're complete i got a couple of fishmongers only yesterday

he spoke as if he had a shot brace of fishmongers and slung them over his shoulder and flung them into market square market square was that portion of the garden home designed for the shopping centre two said mabel two i encourage competition no one is going to sleep in the garden home what will all the bedrooms be used for then sabre inquired mr boon bagshaw who was eating his ham with a fork only holding it at its extremity in the tips of his fingers and occasionally flipping a piece of ham into his mouth and swallowing it without visible mastication flipped another morsel and with his right hand moved three more vases which stood between himself and sabre he moved each deliberately and set it down with a slight thump rather as if it were a chessman he directed the fork at sabre and after impressive moments spoke you know sabre i don't think you're quite alive to what is growing up about you flippancy is out of place i abominate flippancy well dash it it's my house thought sabre this garden home is not speculation it's not a fad it's not a joke what is it

you're thinking it's a damned nuisance you're right it is a damned nuisance sabre began well now listen sabre it is a damned nuisance and i put it to you that when a toad is discovered embedded in a solid mass of coal or stone that coal or stone when it was slowly forming about that toad was a damned nuisance to the toad sabre asked well am i going to be discovered imbedded now listen sabre another man in my place would say that he did not intend to be personal i do intend to be personal i always am personal i say that this garden home is springing up about you and that you are not realizing what is happening this garden home is going to enshrine life as it should be lived more it is going to make life be lived as it should be lived some one said to me the other day the duchess of wearmouth i was staying at the wearmouth castle that the garden home is going to be a sanctuary i said bah like that bah i said

every town every city every village is a sanctuary and asleep in its sanctuary and dead to life in its sanctuary and dead to christ in its sanctuary i said the garden home is not going to be a sanctuary nor yet a sepulchre nor yet a tomb it's going to be a symbol a signal a shout more ham he paused pushed his plate to one side more as if it had bitten him than as if he desired more ham to be placed upon it and looked around the room before him sulkily exercising his chin sabre had a vision of dense crowds of bishops in lawn sleeves duchesses in gainsborough hats and herds of intensely fashionable rank and file applauding vigorously he could almost hear the applause but how to deal with this man he never knew he always felt he was about fourteen when mr boom bagshaw thus addressed him he therefore said great and mabel murmured how splendid but sabre's thought was and it remained with him throughout the meal

acutely illustrated by the impressive monologues which mr boom bagshaw addressed to mabel and by her radiant responses his thought was i simply can't get on with this chap or with any of mabel's crowd they all make me feel like a kid i can't answer them when they talk they see things i've got ideas about but i can never explain my ideas to them i never can argue my ideas with them they've all got convictions and i believe i haven't any convictions i've only got instincts and these convictions come down on instincts like a hammer on an egg mr boom bagshaw was saying and we shall have no poor in the garden home no ugly streets no mean surroundings uplift everywhere uplift there slipped out of sabre aloud there you are that's the kind of thing mr boom bagshaw as if to disclose without fear precisely where he was dismantled from between them the hedge of flowers which he had replaced and looked sulkily across what kind of thing sabre had a vision of himself advancing an egg for mr bagshaw's hammer about having no poor in the garden home isn't there something about the poor being always with us certainly there is in the bible

in the bible do you know to whom it was addressed sabre admitted that he didn't to judas iscariot smash went the egg sabre said feebly he could not handle his arguments well anyway always with us there you are if you're going to create a place where life is going to be lived as it should be lived i don't see how you're going to shut the poor out of it aren't they part of life they've got as much right to get away from the mean streets and ugly surroundings as we have and a jolly sight more need always with us it doesn't matter a tuppence whom it was said to it happens pronounced mr boom bagshaw to matter a great deal more than a twopence it happens to knock the bottom clean out of your argument it was addressed to the iscariot because iscariot was trying to do just what you're trying to do he was trying to make duty to the poor an excuse for grudging service to christ now listen sabre if people thought a little bit less about their duty towards the poor and a little more about their duty towards themselves they would be in a great deal fitter state to help their fellow-creatures poor or rich

that is what the garden home is to do for those who live in it and that is what the garden home is going to do he stabbed sharply with the butt of a dessert knife on the dessert plate which had just been placed before him the plate split neatly into two exact halves he glazed at them sulkily and put them aside drew another plate before him and remarked to mabel you know we are moving to the vicarage to-morrow we are giving an at home to-morrow week will you come the plural pronoun included his mother he was intensely celibate the day ended in a blazing row in the afternoon mr boom bagshaw carried off mabel to view the progress of the garden home while they dallied over coffee at the luncheon-table sabre was fidgeting for bagshaw to be gone mabel operating dexterously behind the blue flame of a spirit-lamp lo jinks hoovering around in well-trained acolyte performances said now i rather pride myself on my turkish coffee mr boom bagshaw mr bagshaw who appeared to pride himself at least as much on his characteristics replied by sulkily looking at his watch a moment later by sulkily taking a cup rather as if he were taking a schoolboy bidden to take lemonade when mannishly desirous of shady gaff and sulkily remarking i must go

sabre fidgeted to see the words put into action he wanted bagshaw to be off he wanted to resume his sudden intention of remedying his normal relations with mabel and the afternoon promise better than the intention had thus far seen then niggling over the unexpectedness of his return well of course it was unexpected an upsetting of her household routine but the unexpectedness was over and the letter incident over and mabel thanks to her guest delightfully mooted good therefore for the afternoon when the dickens was this chap going then bagshaw rising sulkily well you'd better come up and have a look round and mabel animatedly i'd like to and to sabre you won't care to come mark sabre said no i won't throughout dinner mabel returned only just in time to get ready for dinner sabre examined with this passionate interest at the exercise of trying to say certain words and being unable to say them

they conversed desolatorily their usual habit he told himself that he was speaking several hundred other words but the intractable words he desired to utter would not be framed he counted them on his fingers under the table only seven well how was the garden home looking only seven he could not say them the incident they brought up rankled he had come home to take a day off with her she knew he was there at the luncheon-table to take a day off with her it had interested her so little she had been so entirely indifferent to it that she had not even expressed a wish that he should so much as attend her on the inspection with bagshaw the more he thought of it the worse it rankled she knew he was at home to be with her and she had deliberately walked off and left him well how was the garden home looking no not much he couldn't he visualized the impossible seven written on the tablecloth he saw them in script he saw them in print he imagined them written by a finger on the wall say them no

mabel left him sitting at the table with a cigarette there came suddenly to his assistants the fight with the stubborn seven abreast of the thoughts in the office that had brought him home a realisation of her situation such as he had had that first night together in the house eight years before there she was in the morning-room alone she had given up her father's home for his home and there she was a happy afternoon behind her and no one to discuss it with just because he could not say well how is the garden home looking and he thought i'm hateful he got up vigorously and strode into the morning-room well how is the garden home looking his voice was bright and interested she was reading a magazine she did not raise her eyes front the page eh oh very nice delightful tell us about it what oh yes her mind was in the magazine she read on a moment then she laid the magazine on her lap and looked up the garden home yes oh yes it was charming it's simply springing up you ought to have come he stretched himself in a big chair opposite her he laughed well dash it i liked that you didn't exactly implore me to she yawned oh well i knew you wouldn't care about it she yawned again oh dear i'm tired we must have walked miles to and fro

she put down her hands to take up her magazine again she was clearly not interested in his interest but he thought well of course she's not for her it's like eating something after it's got cold dinner was the time he said i expect you did walked miles bagshaw all over it i bet she did what he called tightin herself well naturally he's pleased enthusiastic he's done more than anyone else to keep the idea going sabre laughed i should say so marvelous person what's he going to do about not wearing clerical dress when he has to wear gaiters what do you mean gaiters signs of flying up what on earth for why when he's a bishop don't you she flew up i suppose that's some sneer sneer rot i mean it a chap like bagshaw's not going to be a parish priest all his life he's out to be a bishop and he'll be a bishop if he changed his mind and wanted to be a judge or a cabinet minister he'd be a judge or a cabinet minister he's that sort i knew you were sneering mabel don't be silly i'm not sneering bagshaw's a clever you say he's not that sort that's a sneer she put her hands on the arms of her chair and raised herself to sit uprise she spoke with extraordinary intensity

nearly everything you say to me or my friends is a sneer there's always something behind what you say other people noticed it other people yes other people they say you're sarcastic that's just a polite way he said oh come on now mabel not sarcastic i swear no one thinks i'm sarcastic i promise you bagshaw doesn't bagshaw thinks i'm a fool a complete fool look at lunch she caught him up she was really angry yes look at lunch that's just what i mean any one that comes to the house any of my friends anything they say you must always take differently always argue about it that's what i call sneering he flatly well that isn't sneering let's drop it she had no intention of dropping it it's sneering they don't know it is but i know it is he had the feeling that his anger would arise responsive to hers as one beast calling defiance to another if this continued he did not want it to arise he had sometimes thought of anger as a savage beast chained within a man it had helped him to control rising ill-temper

he thought of it now of her anger he had a vision of it prowling as a dark beast among caves challenging into the night he wished to retain the vision his own anger prowling also would not respond while he retained the picture it was prowling it was suspicious it would be mute while he watched it he pulled himself sharply to his feet well well he said it's not meant to be sneering let's call it my unfortunate manner he stood before her half smiling his hands in his pockets looking down at her she said perhaps you're different with your friends i hope you are with your friends he caught a glint in her eye as she repeated the words its meaning did not occur to him he bantered oh i'm not as bad as all that and anyway the friends are all the same friends this place isn't so big then that glint of her eye was explained the flash before the discharge perhaps your friends are just coming back she said lady tybar the vision of his dark anger broke away mute while he watched it immediately it lifted its head and answered her own look here he began and stopped look here he said more quietly don't begin that absurd business again i don't think it's absurd

no you called it funny she drew in her feet as if to rise yes i think it's funny all of it i think you've been funny all day to-day coming back like that i told you why i came back i have the day off with you funny day off it's been you're right there yes it has been a funny day off he thought my god this bickering why don't i get out of the room come back for a day off with me it's a funny thing you came back just in time to get that letter before it was delivered there now you know he was purely amazed he thought and his amazement was such that characteristically his anger left him he thought well of all the but she otherwise interpreted his astonishment she thought she had made an advantage and she pressed it perhaps you knew it was coming how on earth could i have known it was coming she seemed to pause to be considering she might have told you you might have seen her he said as it happens i did see her not three hours before i came back she seemed disappointed she said i know you did we met lord tybar and he thought good lord she was trying to catch me

she went on you never told me you'd met them wasn't that funny if you'd just think a little you'd seen there was nothing funny about it you found the letter so amazingly funny that to tell you the truth i'd had about enough of the tybars and i've had about enough of them i dare say you have with me perhaps you'll tell me this would you have told me about the letter if i hadn't seen you get it he thought before he answered and he answered out of his thoughts he said slowly i don't believe i would i wouldn't i wouldn't because i would have known perfectly well that you'd have thought it funny no answer he could have made could have more exasperated her i don't believe i would deliberation something incomprehensible to her going on in his mind and as a result of it a statement that no one on earth she felt but he would have made any one else would have said boldly blustering of course i would have told you about the letter she would have liked that she would have disbelieved it and she could have said and enjoying saying she disbelieved it or any one else would have said furiously no i'm damned if i'd shown you the letter she would have liked that

it would have affirmed her suspicions that there was something in it and she wished her suspicions to be affirmed something justifiably incentive of anger of recessment of jealousy something she could understand for she did not understand her husband that was her grievance against him she never had understood him that den incident in the very earliest days of their marriage had been an intimation of a way of looking at things that to her was entirely exasperatingly inexplicable and since then increasingly year by year her understanding had failed to follow him he had retired farther and farther into himself he lived in his mind and she could by no means penetrate into his mind his idea about things his attitude towards things were wholly exasperating incomprehensible to her it's like she had once complained to her father it's like having a foreigner in the house things in her expression went on in his mind and she could not understand what went on in his mind and it exasperated her to know that they were going on and that she could not understand them i don't believe i would characteristic

typical expression for those processes of his mind that she could not understand and then the reason i wouldn't because i'd have known perfectly well that you'd have thought it funny and exasperation on exasperation's head he was right she did think it funny and by his very reply for she knew him well enough so exasperatingly well to know that this was complete sincerity complete truth he proved to her that it was not really funny but merely something she could not understand robbery of her fancy her hope that it was something definite against him something justifiably incentive of resentment of jealousy it was as if he had said you can't understand a letter like this there's nothing in it to understand and that's just what you can't understand look here you see my head i'm in there you can't come in you don't know how to i can't tell you how to nobody could tell you and you wouldn't know what to make of it if you did get in exasperating insufferable unsupportable she could not express her feelings in words she expressed them in action she arose violently and left the room

the whole of her emotion she put into the slam of the door behind her the ornaments shivered a cup sprang off the bracket and dashed itself to pieces on the floor sabre regarded the broken cup much as if sir isaac newton presumably regarded the fallen apple he worked back from the cup through the events of the day and through the events of the day returned to the cup it interested him to find that the fragments on the floor were as logical a result of the movements of the day as they would have been getting the small hand-ax out of the woodshed aiming a blow at the cup and hitting the cup he thought i started to break that cup when i rustled the newspaper at breakfast i went on when i suddenly came back and got into that niggling business over why i'd come back went on when i walked off to my room after that letter business practically took up the axe when i couldn't say well how's the garden home going on at dinner and smashed it when i chafed about bagshaw an hour ago rum business rotten business that was the day's epitaph but for the murder of the cup he found gone to bed and lying awake a culprit other than himself he thought it was meeting nona that made me come home like that

but if that had been the first time i'd ever met nona i shouldn't have returned so it goes back further than that nine ten years the day she married tybar if she hadn't married tybar she'd have married me the cup wouldn't have been broken no no broke that cup chapter four recording by kirk ziggler ogden utah voiceover solutions dot com