Free Short Stories 1927-1956 by Walter de la Mare Page B

that. To me it was merely untrue. It may have been my mentioning that my husband was at Trinity led him astray; but even at that – well, it was so completely out of the blue. Even, too, if Trinidad had been the – the scene of my son’s death, what then?’
    But for the life of him, Ronnie couldn’t blurt out the question that had at once offered itself. He merely went on listening.
    And for a moment Mrs Cotton watched him doing so. ‘But since,’ she pressed on, ‘you have used that particular word – “inartistic”, I mean – do please enlighten me. What kind of people really enjoy Mr Charlton’s kind of writing? It was more or less new to me at the time; but I have noticed since then that though his performance was a little sillier than most, it was quite in the new fashion. Nowadays one has only to write a book, it seems, to make even one’s kitchen cat an animal worth adorning a newspaper with. And not merely literary men but quite young actresses, apart from soaps and cigarettes and cosmetics and that sort of thing, are invited, almost as a matter of course apparently, by editors of newspapers who must be quite intelligent men, to air their views on marriage, or the soul, or a future life – on that sort of thing. Quite as a matter of course. Do you think it much helps?’
    Ronnie gallantly met her eye. ‘Whom?’ he said.
    ‘Ah, who? I was thinking myself of what is called the “man in the street” and the women under his roof. But then, I suppose, there have always been a few talkative sillies in the world who completely underestimate the common-sense of people in general. Or is it getting old, Mr Forbes, that makes the sillies of one’s latter days seem a little sillier than usual? My own small view is that life may be tragic and sorrowful enough in the long-run – and for the young actresses, too, poor things; they’ve much to lose: but that it isn’t – well, just Trinidad and thunderstorms. There may be things, I mean, better left unsaid.’
    Ronnie stirred in his chair. He hadn’t intended this little turn to the talk. ‘Exactly,’ he agreed. ‘Still you wouldn’t suggest even Cyril Charlton meant to be as bad as all that?’
    ‘Be fair to me, Mr Forbes. Haven’t I already confessed that I thought him an almost entirely harmless-looking young man? “Meant to be”, indeed! I doubt if he was conscious of so much as brushing the down off a butterfly’s wing. Yet, would you believe it, my brother, Major Winslow, at that time in India, was inclined, though not for my son’s sake only, to take more drastic steps. It was only with the greatest difficulty that I persuaded him not to consult his lawyer.’
    Yet again a curiously muffled and not quite unjangled peal of little bells sounded between the walls. Mrs Cotton had laughed. And at sound of it a remote, fiery, defiant gleam had flamed up and vanished in Ronnie’s brown eye.
    ‘If I may venture to say so,’ he said stoutly, ‘I think that course would have been as ill-advised as it would have been ineffective.’
    Mrs Cotton graciously beamed at him. ‘I am delighted to hear you say so,’ she assured him. ‘Those were, I believe, almost the precise words I used in my reply to Major Winslow. Idle nonsense of that sort, however shallow and however false, is not libellous. And – whether or not after actual consultation with his lawyer, I cannot say – he came round in the end to our way of looking at it. Poor Mr Charlton! I can see him in the witness-box! But I referred to Major Winslow merely as an example of what I suppose would be called the Philistine view of Mr Charlton’s form of entertainment. My brother’s and mine. What is more, I am entrusting these little confidences to your ear alone, simply because even if we neither of us have any particular friendliness for this young man, we don’t bear him any ill-will. So far as I am concerned, he can be left to stew in his own juice.’ Mrs Cotton nearly doubled her