 Awakening. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Ava Harnick, Ponte Vedra, Florida. The Foresight Saga by John Galswersi. Part 1 Awakening. Through the massive skylight illuminating the hall at Robin Hill, the July sunlight at five o'clock fell just where the broad stairway turned. And in that radiant streak, little John Foresight stood blue-linen suited. His hair was shining and his eyes from beneath a frown, for he was considering how to go downstairs, this last of innumerable times before the car brought his father and mother home. Four at a time and five at the bottom, stale. Down the banisters, but in which fashion? On his face, feet foremost, very stale. On his stomach sideways, paltry. On his back, with his arms stretched down on both sides, forbidden. Or on his face, head foremost, in a manner unknown as yet to any, but himself? Such was the cause of the frown on the illuminated face of little John. In that summer of nineteen-nine, the simple souls who even then desired to simplify the English tongue had of course no cognizance of little John, or they would have claimed him for a disciple. But one can be too simple in this life. His real name was Julian, and his living father and dead half-brother had usurped of old the other shortening, Joe and Jolly. As a fact little John had done his best to conform to convention and spell himself first J-H-O-N. And then J-O-H-N, not till his father had explained the sheer necessity, had he spelled his name J-O-N. Up till now that father had possessed what was left of his heart by the groom Bob, who played the concertina and his nurse, Dar, who wore the violet dress on Sundays and enjoyed the name of Spraggins in that private life lived at odd moments even by domestic servants. His mother had only appeared to him as it were in dreams, smelling delicious, smoothing his forehead just before he fell asleep, and sometimes docking his head of a golden-brown color. When he cut his head open against the nursery fender she was there to be bled over, and when he had nightmare she would sit on his bed and cuddle his head against her neck. She was precious but remote, because Dar was so near, and there is hardly room for more than one woman at a time in a man's heart. His father too, of course, he had special bonds of union, for little John also meant to be a painter when he grew up, with the one small difference that his father painted pictures, and little John intended to paint ceilings and walls, standing on a board between two-step ladders in a dirty white apron and a lovely smell of whitewash. His father also took him riding in Richmond Park on his pony mouse, so called because it was so colored. Little John had been born with a silver spoon in a mouse which was rather curly and large. He had never heard his father or his mother speak in an angry voice, either to each other, himself, or anybody else. The groom, Bob, Cook, Jane, Bella, and the other servants, even Dar, who alone restrained him in his courses, had special voices when they talked to him. He was therefore of opinion that the world was a place of perfect and perpetual gentility and freedom. A child of 1901, he had come to consciousness when his country just over that bad attack of scarlet fever, the Boer War, was preparing for the liberal revival of 1906. Coercion was unpopular. Their parents had exalted notions of giving their offspring a good time. They spoiled their rods, spared their children, and anticipated the results with enthusiasm. In choosing, moreover, for his father an amiable man of 52 who had already lost an only son and for his mother a woman of 38 whose first and only child he was, Little John had done well and wisely. What had saved him from becoming a cross between a lapdog and a little pig had been his father's adoration of his mother. For even Little John could see that she was not merely just his mother and that he played second fiddle to her in his father's heart. What he played in his mother's heart he knew not yet. As for Aunty June, his half-sister but so old that she had grown out of the relationship, she loved him, of course, but was too sudden. His devoted daughter too had a spartan touch. His boss was cold and his knees were bare. He was not encouraged to be sorry for himself. As to the next question of his education, Little John shared the theory of those who considered that children should not be forced. He rather liked the mademoiselle who came for two hours every morning to teach him her language, together with history, geography and sums. Nor were the piano lessons which his mother gave him disagreeable. For she had a way of luring him from tune to tune, never making him practice one which did not give him pleasure, so that he remained eager to convert ten thumbs into eight fingers. Under his father he learned to draw pleasure pigs and other animals. He was not a highly educated little boy, yet on the whole the silver spoon stayed in his mouse without spoiling it, though Da sometimes said that other children would do him a world of good. It was a disillusionment then when at the age of nearly seven she held him down on his back because he wanted to do something of which she did not approve. This first interference with the free individualism of a foresight drove him almost frantic. There was something appalling in the utter helplessness of that position and the uncertainty as to whether it would ever come to an end. Suppose she never let him get up any more. He suffered torture at the top of his voice for fifty seconds. Worse than anything was his perception that Da had taken all that time to realize the agony of fear he was enduring. Thus dreadfully was revealed to him the lack of imagination in the human being. When he was let up he remained convinced that Da had done a dreadful thing. Though he did not wish to bear witness against her, he had been compelled by fear of repetition to seek his mother and say, Mom, don't let Da hold me down on my back again. His mother, her hands held up over her head and in them two plates of hair, collared the furry mort. As little John had not yet learned to call it, had looked at him with eyes like little bits of his brown velvet tunic and answered, No darling, I won't. She being in the nature of her goddess, little John was satisfied. Especially when from under the dining table at breakfast where he happened to be waiting for a mushroom he had overheard her say to his father. Then will you tell Da dear or shall I? He was so devoted to him and his father's answer, well, she mustn't show it that way. I know exactly what it feels like to be held down on one's back. No foresight can stand it for a minute. Conscious that they did not know him to be under the table, little John was visited by the quite new feeling of embarrassment and stayed where he was ravaged by desire for the mushroom. Such had been his first dip into the dark abyss of existence. Nothing much had been revealed to him after that, till one day having gone down to the cowhouse for his drink of milk fresh from the cow, after Garrett had finished milking, he had seen Clover's calf dead. Inconsolable and followed by an upset Garrett, he had sought Da, but suddenly aware that she was not the person he wanted, had rushed away to find his father and had run into the arms of his mother. Clover's calf's dead, oh, oh, it looked so soft. His mother's glass and her, yes, darling, there, there, had stayed his sobbing. But if Clover's calf could die, anything could, not only bees, flies, beetles and chickens, and look soft like that. This was appalling and soon forgotten. The next thing had been to sit on a bumblebee, a poignant experience, which his mother had understood much better than Da, and nothing of vital importance had happened after that till the year turned when, following a day of utter wretchedness, he had enjoyed a disease composed of little spots, bed, honey in a spoon, and many tangerine oranges. It was then that the world had flowered. To Aunty June he owed that flowering, for no sooner was he a little lame duck, then she came rushing down from London bringing with her the books which had nurtured her own berserker spirit, born in the noted year of 1869, aged and of many colors they were stored with the most formidable happenings. Of these she read to little John till he was allowed to read to himself, whereupon she whisked back to London and left them with him in a heap. Those books cooked his fancy till he sought and dreamed of nothing but midshipmen and dolls, pirates, rafts, sandalwood traders, iron horses, sharks, battles, tartars, red Indians, balloons, north poles, and other extravagant delights. The moment he was suffered to get up he rigged his bed fore and aft and set out from it in a narrow bath across green seas of carpet to a rock which he climbed by means of its mahogany drawernobs to sweep the horizon with his drinking tumblers screwed to his eye in search of rescuing sails. He made a daily raft out of the towel stand, the tea tray and his pillows. He saved the juice from his French plums, bottled it in an empty medicine bottle and provisioned the raft with the rum that it became. Also this pemmicham made out of little saved up bits of chicken set on and dried at the fire and with lime juice against curvy extracted from the peel of his oranges and the little economized juice. He made a north pole one morning from the hole of his bedclothes except the bolster and reached it in a birch bark canoe in private life defender after a terrible encounter with a polar bear fashioned from the bolster and four skittles dressed up in Dahl's nightgown. After that his father seeking to steady his imagination brought him Ivanhoe Bevis, a book about King Arthur and Tom Brown's school days. He read the first and for three days built defended and stormed from the buff castle taking every part in the piece except those of Rebecca and Rowena with piercing cries of Anna Vaughn, the Brassi and similar utterances. After reading the book about King Arthur he became almost exclusively Sir Lamarack the Gullies because though there was very little about him he preferred his name to that of any other night and he wrote his old rocking horse to death armed with a long bamboo. Bevis he found tame besides it required woods and animals of which he had none in his nursery except his two cats Fitz and Puck Forsythe who permitted no liberties. For Tom Brown he was as yet too young. There was relief in the house when after the force week he was permitted to go down and out. The months being marched the trees were exceptionally like the mass of ships and for little John that was a wonderful spring. Extremely hard on his knees suits and the patience of Dar who had the washing and reparation of his clothes. Every morning the moment his breakfast was over he could be viewed by his mother and father whose windows looked out that way coming from the study, crossing the terrace, climbing the old oak tree his face resolute and his hair bright. He began the day thus because there was no time to go far afield before his lessons. The old tree's variety never staled. It had main mast, fore mast, top gallant mast and he could always come down by the halyards or ropes of the swing. After his lessons completed by eleven he would go to the kitchen for a same piece of cheese, a biscuit and two French plums. Provision enough for a jolly boat at least and eat in some imaginative way. Then on to the tease with gun, pistols and sword he would begin the serious climbing of the morning encountering by the way innumerable slavers, Indians, pirates, leopards and bears. He was seldom seen at that hour of the day without a cutlass in his teeth like Dick Needham amid the rapid explosion of copper caps and many were the gardeners he brought down with yellow peas shot out of his little gun. He lived a life of the most violent action. John said his father to his mother under the oak tree is terrible. I am afraid he's going to turn out a sailor or something hopeless. Do you see any sign of his appreciating beauty? Not the faintest. Well, thank heaven he has no turn for wheels or engines. I can bear anything but that. But I wish he would take more interest in nature. He's imaginative, Julian. Yes, in a sanguinary way. Does he love anyone just now? No, only everyone. There never was anyone born more loving or more lovable than John. Being your boy, Irene. At this moment, little John lying along a branch high above them brought them down with two peas. But that fragment of talk launched sick in his small gizzard. Loving, lovable, imaginative, sanguinary. The leaves also were sick by now and it was time for his birthday, which occurring every year on the 12th of May was always memorable for his chosen dinner of sweet bread, mushrooms, macaroons and ginger beer. Between that eighth birthday, however, and the afternoon when he stood in the July radiance at the turning of the stairway, several important things had happened. Dar, worn out by washing his knees or moved by that mysterious instinct which forces even nurses to desert their nurselings, left the very day after his birthday in floods of tears to be married of all things to a man. Little John from whom it had been kept was inconsolable for an afternoon. It ought not to have been kept from him. Two large boxes of soldiers and some artillery together with the young booglers which had been among his birthday presents cooperated with his grief in a sort of conversion and instead of seeking adventures in person and risking his own life he began to play imaginative games in which he risked the lives of countless thin soldiers, marbles, stones and beans. Of these forms of share a kanon he made collections and using them alternately fought the peninsula the seven years, the thirty years and other wars about which he had been reading of late in a big history of Europe which had been his grandfathers. He altered them to suit his genius and fought them all over the floor in his day nursery so that nobody could come in for fearing of disturbing Gustavus Adolphus king of Sweden or treading on an army of Austrians. Because of the sound of the word he was passionately addicted to the Austrians and finding there were so few battles in which they were successful he had to invent them in his games. His favorite generals were Prince Eugene, the Archduke Charles and Wallenstein. Tillie and Mac, music hall turns he heard his father call them one day whatever that might mean, one really could not lack very much. Austrians though they were. For euphonic reasons too he dotted on to Ren. This phase which caused his parents' anxiety because it kept him indoors when he ought to have been out lasted through May and half of June till his father killed it by bringing home to him Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. When he read those books something happened in him and he went out of doors again in passionate quest of a river. There being none on the premises at Robin Hill he had to make one out of the pond which fortunately had water lilies, dragonflies, nets, bullrushes and three small willow trees. On this pond after his father and Garrett had a certain by sounding that it had a reliable bottom and was nowhere more than two feet deep he was allowed a little collapsible canoe in which he spent hours and hours paddling and lying down out of sight of India and Joe and other enemies. On the shore of the pond too he built himself a wigwam about four feet square of old biscuit tins roofed in by bows. In this he would make little fires and cook the birds he had not shot with his gun hunting in the copies and fields or the fish he did not catch in the pond because there were none. This occupied the rest of June and that July when his father and mother were away in Ireland. He led a lonely life of make-believe during those five weeks of summer weather with gun, wigwam, water and canoe and however hard his active little brain tried to keep the sense of beauty away she did creep in on him for a second now and then perching on the wing of a dragonfly glistening on the water lilies or brushing his eyes with her blue as he lay on his back in ambush. Aunty June who had been left in charge had a grown-up in the house with a cough and a large piece of putty which he was making interface although she hardly ever came down to see him in the pond. Once, however, she brought with her two other grown-ups little John who happened to have painted his naked self bright blue and yellow in stripes out of his father's watercolor box and put some duck feathers in his hair saw them coming and ambushed himself among the willows. As he had foreseen they came at once to his wigwam and knelt down to look inside so that with a blood curdling yell he was able to take the sculpts of Aunty June and the woman grown-up in an almost complete manner before they kissed him. The names of the two grown-ups were Aunty Holly and Uncle Val who had a brown face and a little limb and laughed at him terribly. He took a fancy to Aunty Holly who seemed to be a sister too but they both went away the same afternoon and he did not see them again. Three days before his father and mother were to come home Aunty June also went off in a great hurry taking the grown-up who coughed and his piece of putty and Mademoiselle said poor man, he was very ill. I forbid you to go into his room, John. Little John, who rarely did sing smelly because he was told not to, reframed from going though he was bored and lonely. In truth the day of the pond was past and he was filled to the brim of his soul with restlessness and the want of something not a tree, not a gun, something soft. Those last two days had seemed months in spite of cast up by the sea wherein he was reading about Mother Lee and her terrible wrecking bonfire. He had gone up and down the stairs perhaps a hundred times in those two days and often from the day nursery where he slept now he turned into his mother's room looked at everything without touching and on into the dressing room and standing on one leg beside the bath like Slingspy had whispered ho ho ho dog my cats mysteriously to bring luck. Then stealing back he had opened his mother's wardrobe and taken a long sniff which seemed to bring him nearer to he did not know what. He had done this just before he stood in the streak of sunlight debating in which of the several ways he should slide down the banisters. They all seemed silly and in a sudden languor he began descending the steps one by one. During that descent he could remember his father quite distinctly. The short gray beard the deep eyes twinkling the furrow between them the funny smile the thin figure which always seemed so tall to little John but his mother he could not see all that represented her was something swaying with two dark eyes looking back at him and the scent of her wardrobe. Bella was in the hall drawing aside the big curtains and opening the front door. Little John said wheezing Bella yes master John do let's have tea under the oak tree when they come I know they would like it best you mean you would like it best Little John considered no they would to please me Bella smiled very well I will take it out if you will stay quiet here and not getting to mischief before they come. Little John sat down on the bottom step and nodded Bella came close and looked him over get up she said Little John got up she scrutinized him behind he was not green and his knees seemed clean all right she said my aren't you brown give me a kiss and Little John received a peck on his head what damn he asked I'm so tired of waiting gooseberry and strawberry mmm they were his favorites when she was gone he sat still for quite a minute it was quiet in the big hall open to its east end so that he could see one of his trees a brick sailing very slowly across the upper lawn in the outer hall shadows were slanting from the pillars Little John got up jumped one of them and walked around the clump of iris plants which filled the pool of grey white marble in the center the flowers were pretty only smelled a very little he stood in the open doorway and looked out suppose suppose they didn't come he had waited so long that he felt he could not bear that and his attention slid at once from such finality to the dust modes in the blue sunlight coming in thrusting his hand up he tried to catch some but the umbrella ought to have dusted that piece of air but perhaps they weren't dust only what sunlight was made of and he looked to see whether the sunlight out of doors was the same it was not he had said he would stay quiet in the hall but he simply could not any more and crossing the gravel of the drive he lay down on the grass pulling six daisies he named them carefully Sir Lamorak Sir Tristram Sir Lancelot Sir Palimides Sir Bors Sir Gawain and fought them in couples till only Sir Lamorak whom he had selected for a specially stark had his head on and even he after three encounters looked worn and waggly a beetle was moving slowly in the grass which almost wanted cutting every blade was a small tree round whose trunk the beetle had to glide little John stretched out Sir Lamorak feet foremost and stirred the creature up it scuttled painfully little John laughed lost interest and sighed his heart felt empty he turned over and lay on his back there was a scent of honey from the lime trees in flower and in the sky the blue was beautiful with a few white clouds which looked and perhaps tasted like lemon eyes he could hear Bob playing way down upon the souvenir on his concertina and it made him nice and sad he turned over again and put his ear to the ground Indians could hear things coming ever so far but he could hear nothing only the concertina and almost instantly he did hear a grinding sound a faint tooth yes it was a car coming coming up he jumped should he wait in the porch or rush upstairs and as they come in shout look and slide slowly down the banister's head foremost should he the car turned in at the drive it was too late and he only waited jumping up and down in his excitement the car came quickly weird and stopped his father got out exactly like life he bent down and little John bobbed up they bumped his father said bless us well old man you are brown just as he would and the sense of expectation of something wanted bubbled unextinguished in little John then with a long shy look his mother in a blue dress with a blue motor scarf over her cap and her smiling he jumped as high as ever he could twined his legs behind her back and hugged he hurt her gauze and felt her hugging back his eyes very dark blue just then looked into her very dark brown eyes closed on his eyebrow and squeezing with all his might he hurt her creak and laugh and say you are strong John he slid down and dead and rushed into the hall dragging her by the hand while he was eating his jam beneath the oak tree he noticed things about his mother that he had never seemed to see before her cheeks for instance were creamy and there were silver threads in her dark goldy hair her throat had no knob in it like bellows and she went in and out softly he noticed too some little lines running away from the corners of her eyes and a nice darkness under them she was ever so beautiful more beautiful than Da or Mademoiselle or Aunty June or even Aunty Holly to whom he had taken a fancy even more beautiful than Bella who had pink cheeks and came out too suddenly in places this new beautifulness of his mother had a kind of particular importance and he had less than he had expected to when he was over his father wanted him to walk round the gardens he had a long conversation with his father about things in general avoiding his private life Sir Lamarac, the Austrians and the emptiness he had felt these last three days now so suddenly filled up his father told him of a place called Glence of Antrim where he and his mother had been and of the little people who came out of the ground there when it was very quiet little John came to a halt with his heels apart do you really believe they do daddy no John but I thought you might why? you are younger than I and they are fairies little John squared the dimple in his chin I don't believe in fairies I never see any ha! said his father does mom his father smiled his funny smile no she only sees pen what is pen? the goaty goat who skips about in wild and beautiful places was he in Glence of Antrim? mom said so little John took his heels up and led on did you see him? no I only saw Venus and a Diomene little John reflected Venus was in his book about the Greeks and Trojans then Anna was her Christian and Diomene her surname but it appeared on inquiry that it was one word which meant rising from the foam did she rise from the foam in Glence of Antrim? yes, every day what is she like daddy? like mom oh, then she must be but he stopped at that rushed at a wall scrambled up and promptly scrambled down again the discovery that his mother was beautiful was one which he felt must absolutely be kept to himself his father's cigar however took so long to smoke that at last he was compelled to say I want to see what moms brought home do you mind daddy? he pitched the motive low to absolve him from unmanliness and was a little disconcerted when his father looked at him right through heaved an important sigh and answered all right old man you go and love her he went with a pretense of slowness and then rushed to make up he entered her bedroom from his own the door being open she was still kneeling before a trunk and he stood close to her quite still she knelt up straight and said well John, I thought I would just come and see having given and received another hug he mounted the window seat and tucking his legs up under him watched her unpack he derived a pleasure from the operation such as he had not yet known partly because she was taking out things which looked suspicious and partly because he liked to look at her she moved differently from anybody else especially from Bella she was certainly the refinadest looking person he had ever seen she finished the trunk at last and nailed down in front of him have you missed us John little John nodded and having thus admitted his feelings continued to nod but you had auntie June oh, she had a man with a cough his mother's face changed and looked almost angry he added hastily he was a poor man mom he coughed awfully I liked him his mother put her hands behind his waist you like everybody John? little John considered up to a point he said auntie June took me to church one Sunday to church? oh she wanted to see how it would affect me and did it? yes, I came over all funny so she took me home again very quick I wasn't sick after all I went to bed and had hot brandy and water and read the voice of Beechwood it was scrumptious his mother bit her lip when was that? oh, about a long time ago I wanted her to take me again but she wouldn't you and daddy never go to church do you? no, we don't why don't you? his mother smiled well dear we both of us went when we were little perhaps we went when we were too little I see, said little John it is dangerous you shall judge for yourself about all those things as you grow up little John replied in a calculating manner I don't want to grow up much I don't want to go to school a sudden overwhelming desire to say something more to say what he really felt turned him red I want to stay with you and be your lover, mom then with an instinct to improve the situation he added quickly I don't want to go to bed tonight either I am simply tired of going to bed every night have you had any more nightmares? only about one may I leave the door open into your room tonight, mom? yes, just a little little John heaved a sigh of satisfaction what did you see in Glens of Antrim? nothing but beauty darling what exactly is beauty? what exactly is? oh John that's a poser can I see it for instance? his mother got up and sat beside him you do every day the sky is beautiful the stars and moonlit nights and then the birds the flowers, the trees they are all beautiful look out of the window there is beautiful you John oh yes that's the view, is that all? all? no the sea is wonderfully beautiful and the waves with their foam flying back do you rise from it every day, mom? his mother smiled well, we bathed little John suddenly reached out and caught her neck in his hands I know he said mysteriously you are it really and all the rest is make-believe she sighed laughed said oh John little John said critically and Bella beautiful for instance I hardly do Bella is young that is something but you look younger mom if you bump against Bella she hats I don't believe da was beautiful when I come to think of it and Mademoiselle is almost ugly Mademoiselle has a very nice face oh yes nice I love your little raise, mom raise little John put his finger to the outer corner of her eye oh those but they are a sign of age they come when you smile but they use not to oh well I like them do you love me, mom? I do, I do love you darling ever so more than I thought you did much much more well so do I so that makes it even conscious that he had never in his life so given himself away he felt a sudden reaction to the manliness of Sir Lamarack Dick Needham Huck Finn and other heroes shall I show you a sing or two he said and slipping out of her arms he stood on his head then fired by her obvious admiration he mounted the bed and threw himself head foremost from his feet on to his back without touching anything with his hands he did this several times that evening having inspected what they have brought he stayed up to dinner between them at the little round table they used when they were alone he was extremely excited his mother wore a French grey dress with scrimi lace made out of little skrigly roses round her neck which was browner than the lace he kept looking at her till at last his father's funny smile made him suddenly attentive to his slice of pineapple it was later then he had ever stayed up when he went to bed his mother went up with him and he undressed very slowly so as to keep her there when at last he had nothing on but his pajamas he said promise you won't go while I say my prayers I promise kneeling down and plunging his face into the bed carried up under his breath opening one eye now and then to see her standing perfectly still with a smile on her face our father so went his last prayer which art in heaven hallowed be thy mom thy kingdom mom on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily mom and forgive us our trespasses on earth as it is in heaven and trespass against us for thine is the evil the power and the glory forever and ever amen look out he sprang and for a long minute remained in her arms once in bed he continued to hold her hand you won't shut the door anymore than that will you are you going to belong mom I must go down and play to daddy oh well I shall hear you I hope not you must go to sleep I can sleep any night well this is just a night like any other oh no it is extra special on extra special nights one always sleep soundest but if I go to sleep mom I shan't hear you come up well when I do I will come in and give you a kiss then if you are awake you will know and if you are not you will still know you have had one little John sighed alright he said I suppose I must put up with that mom yes what was her name that daddy believes in Venus Anna Diomedes oh my angel Anna Diomedes yes but I like my name for you much better what is yours John little John answered Charlie Guinevere it is out of the round table I have only just sort of it only of course her hair was down his mother's eyes looking past him seemed to float you won't forget to come mom not if you will go to sleep that's a bargain then and little John screwed up his eyes he felt her lips on his forehead had her footsteps opened his eyes to see her gliding through the doorway and sighing screwed them up again then time began for some ten minutes of it he tried loyally to sleep counting a great number of thistles in a row does old recipe for bringing slumber he seemed to have been hours counting it must he sort with nearly time for her to come up now he threw the bed closes back I am hot he said and his voice sounded funny in the darkness like someone else's why didn't she come John he set up he must look he got out of bed went to the window and pulled the curtain a slice aside it wasn't dark but he couldn't tell whether because of daylight or the moon which was very big it had a funny wicked face as if laughing at him and he did not want to look at it then remembering that his mother had said moonlit nights were beautiful he continued to stare out in a general way the streets through six shadows the lawn looked like spilt milk and the long long way he could see oh very far right over the world and it all looked different and swimmy there was a lovely smell too in his open window I wish I had a dove like Noah he sought the moony moon was round and bright it shone and shone and made it light after that rhyme which came into his head all at once he became conscious of music very soft lovely mum playing he besought himself of a macaroon he had laid up in his chest of drawers and getting it came back to the window he leaned out now munching now holding his jaw to hear the music better Da used to say that angels played on harps in heaven but it wasn't half so lovely as mum playing in the moony night with him eating a macaroon a cockshafer buzzed by a moss flew in his face the music stopped and little John drew his head in she must be coming he did not want to be found awake he got back into bed and pulled the clothes nearly over his head but he had left the streak of moonlight coming in it fell across the floor near the foot of the bed and he watched it moving ever so slowly towards him as if it were alive the music began again but he could only just hear it now sleepy music pretty sleepy music sleepy sleep and time slipped by the music rose fell seized the moon beam crept towards his face little John turned in his sleep till he lay on his back with one brown fist still grasping the bed clothes the corners of his eyes twitched he had begun to dream he dreamed he was drinking milk out of a pan that was the moon the black cat which watched him with a funny smile like his father's he heard it whispered don't drink too much it was the cat's milk of course and he put out his hand amicably to stroke the creature but it was no longer there the pan had become a bed in which he was lying and when he tried to get out he couldn't find the edge he couldn't find it he could not get out it was dreadful he whimpered in his sleep the bed had begun to go round too it was outside him and inside him going round and round and getting fiery and motherly out of cast up by the sea was stirring it oh so horrible she looked faster and faster while he and the bed and motherly and the moon and the cat were all one wheel going round and round and up and up awful awful awful he shrieked a voice saying darling darling got through the wheel and he awoke standing on his bed with his eyes wide open there was his mother with her hair like green wears and clutching her in it oh oh it is alright treasure you are awake now there there it is nothing but little john continued to say oh oh her voice went on velvet in his ear it was the moonlight sweetheart coming on your face little john burbled into her nightgown you said it was beautiful oh john who let it in did you draw the curtains I wanted to see the time I I looked out I I heard you playing mom I I ate my macaron but he was growing slowly comforted and the instinct to excuse his fear revived within him motherly went round in me and got all fiery he mumbled what can you expect if you eat macaroons after you have gone to bed only one mom it made the music ever so more beautiful I was waiting for you I nearly thought it was tomorrow my tucky it is only just eleven now little john was silent rubbing his nose on her neck mom is daddy in your room not tonight can I come if you wish my precious half himself again little john drew back you look different mom ever so younger it is my hair darling little john laid hold of it thick dark gold with a few silver threads I like it he said I like you best of all like this taking her hand he begun dragging her towards the door he shut it as they passed with a sigh of relief which side of the bed do you like mom the left side alright wasting no time giving her no chance to change her mind little john got into the bed which seemed much softer than his own he heaved another sigh screwed his head into the pillow and lay examining the battle of chariots and swords and spears which always went on outside blankets where the little hair stood up against the light it wasn't anything really was it he said from before her glass his mother answered nothing but the moon and your imagination heated up you mustn't get so excited john but still not quite in possession of his nerves little john answered boastfully I wasn't afraid really of course and again he lay watching the spears and chariots it all seemed very long oh mom do hurry up darling I have to plate my head oh not tonight you will only have to unplate it again tomorrow I'm sleeping now if you don't come I shan't be sleepy soon he stood up white and flowy before the winged mirror he could see three of her with her neck turned and her hair bright under the light and her dark eyes smiling it was unnecessary and he said do come mom I am waiting very well my love I will come little john closed his eyes everything was turning out most satisfactory he felt the bad shake she was getting in and still with his eyes closed he said sleepily it is nice isn't it he heard her voice say something felt her lips touching his nose and snuggling up beside her who lay awake and loved him with her thoughts he fell into the dreamless sleep which rounded off his past end of awakening recording by Ava Harnick Pontavedra, Florida Part 1 Chapter 1 of To Let This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Leanne Howlett The foresight Saga 3 To Let by John Galsworthy Part 1 Chapter 1 Encounter Somes foresight emerged from the Knightsbridge Hotel where he was staying in the afternoon of the 12th of May 1920 with the intention of visiting a collection of pictures in a gallery off Cork Street and looking into the future he walked since the war he never took a cab their drivers were in his view an uncivil lot though now that the war was over and supply beginning to exceed demand again getting more civil in accordance with the custom of human nature still he had not forgiven them deeply identifying them with gloomy memories and now dimly like all members of their class with revolution the considerable anxiety he had passed through during the war and the more considerable anxiety he had since undergone in the peace had produced psychological consequences in a tenacious nature he had mentally so frequently experienced ruin that he ceased to believe in its material probability paying away 4,000 a year in income and super tax one could not very well be worse off a fortune of a quarter of a million encumbered only by a wife and one daughter and very diversely invested afforded substantial guarantee even against that wild cat notion a levity on capital and as to confiscation of war profits he was entirely in favor of it for he had none and served the beggars right the price of pictures moreover had if anything gone up and he had done better with his collection since the war began than ever before air raids also had acted beneficially on a spirit mentally cautious and hardened a character already dogged to be in danger of being entirely dispersed inclined one to be less apprehensive of the more partial dispersions involved in levies and taxation while the habit of condemning the impudence of the Germans had led naturally to condemning that of labor if not openly at least in the sanctuary of his soul he walked there was moreover time to spare it was to meet him at the gallery at four o'clock and it was as yet but half past two it was good for him to walk his liver was a little constricted and his nerves rather on edge his wife was always out when she was in town and his daughter would fliberty gibbet all over the place like most young women since the war still he must be thankful that she had been too young to do anything in that war itself not of course that he had not supported the war from its inception with all his soul but between that and supporting it with the bodies of his wife and daughter there had been a gap fixed by something old fashioned within him which abhorred emotional extravagance he had for instance strongly objected to Annette so attractive and in 1914 only 34 going to her native France her Cherpatrie as under the stimulus of war she began to call it to nurse her for soothe ruining her health and her looks as if she were really a nurse he had put a stopper on it let her do needlework for them at home or knit she had not gone therefore and had never been quite the same woman since a bad tendency of hers to mock at him not openly but in continual little ways had grown as for Fleur the war had resolved the vexed problem whether or not she should go to school she was better away from her mother in her war mood from the chance of air raids and the impetus to do extravagant things so he had placed her in a seminary as far west as had seemed to him compatible with excellence and had missed her horribly Fleur he had never regretted the somewhat outlandish name by which at her birth he had decided so suddenly to call her marked concession though it had been to the French Fleur a pretty name a pretty child but restless, too restless and willful knowing her power too over her father Somes often reflected on the mistake it was to do it on his daughter to get old and do it 65 he was getting on but he didn't feel it for fortunately perhaps considering Annette's youth and good looks his second marriage had turned out a cool affair he had known but one real passion in his life for that first wife of his Irene yes and that fellow, his cousin Jolian who had gone off with her was looking very shaky they said no wonder at 72 after 20 years of a third marriage Somes paused a moment in his march to lean over the railings of the row a suitable spot for reminiscence halfway between that house in Park Lane his birth and his parents' deaths and the little house in Montpelier Square where 35 years ago he had enjoyed his first edition of matrimony now after 20 years of his second edition that old tragedy seemed to him like a previous existence which had ended when Fleur was born in place of the son he had hoped for for many years he had ceased regretting even vaguely the son who had not been born Fleur filled the bill in his heart after all she bore his name and he was not looking forward at all to the time when she would change it indeed if he ever thought of such a calamity it was seasoned by the vague feeling that he could make her rich enough to purchase perhaps and extinguish the name of the fellow who married her why not since as it seemed women were equal to men nowadays and Somes secretly convinced that they were not passed his curved hand over his face vigorously till it reached the comfort of his chin thanks to of steamy as habits he had not grown fat and gabby his nose was pale and thin his gray mustache close clipped his eyesight unimpaired a slight stoop closed and corrected the expansion given to his face by the heightening of his forehead and the recession of his gray hair little change had time wrought in the warmest of the young foresight as the last of the old foresight as Timothy now in his hundred and first year would have phrased it the shade from the plain trees fell on his neat Hamburg hat he had given up top hats it was no use attracting attention to wealth in days like these plain trees his thoughts traveled sharply to Madrid the Easter before the war when having to make up his mind about that Goya picture he had taken a voyage of discovery to study the painter on his spot the fellow had impressed him great range, real genius highly as the chap ranked he would rank even higher before they had finished with him the second Goya craze would be greater even than the first oh yes, and he had bought on that visit he had as never before commissioned a copy of a fresco painting called Love and Demia wherein was the figure of a girl with an arm of Kimbo of his daughter he had it now in the gallery at Maple Durham and rather poor it was you couldn't copy Goya he would still look at it however if his daughter were not there for the sake of something irresistibly reminiscent in the light erect balance of the figure the width between the arching eyebrows the eager dreaming of the dark eyes curious that Flora should have dark eyes when his own were gray no pure foresight had brown eyes and her mother's blue but of course her grandmother Lamont's eyes were dark as treacle he began to walk on again toward Hyde Park corner no greater change in all England than in the row born almost with inhale of it he could remember it from 1860 on brought there as a child between the Quinolins to stare at tight trouser dandies and whiskers riding with a cavalry seat to watch the doffing of curly brimmed in white top hats the leisurely air of it all and the little bow-legged man and a long red waistcoat who used to come among the fashion with dogs on several strings and try to sell one to his mother King Charles Spaniels Italian Greyhounds affectionate to her Quenolin you never saw them now you saw no quality of any sort indeed just working people sitting in dull rows with nothing to stare at but a few young bouncing females wearing brown hats riding astride or desultory colonials charging up and down on dismal-looking hacks with here and there little girls on ponies or old gentlemen jogging their livers or an orderly trying a great galloping cavalry horse no thoroughbreds no grooms no bowing, no scraping, no gossip nothing only the trees the same a democratic England disheveled, hurried, noisy and seemingly without an apex and that something fastidious in the soul of Psalms turned over within him gone forever the close burl of rank and polish wealth there was, oh yes, wealth he himself was a richer man than his father had ever been but manners, flavor quality, all gone engulfed in one vast ugly, shoulder rubbing petro-smelling, cheerio little half-beaten pockets of gentility and cast working here and there dispersed and chetif as Annette would say but nothing ever again firm and coherent to look up to and into this new hurly-burly of bad manners and loose morals his daughter, flower of his life was flung and when those labor chaps got power if they ever did the worst was yet to come he passed out under the archway at last no longer thank goodness disfigured by the gun-grey of its searchlight they'd better put a searchlight on to where they're all going, he thought and light up their precious democracy and he directed his steps along the club fronts of Piccadilly George Forsyte, of course would be sitting in the bay window of the Asseum the chap was so big now that he was there nearly all his time like some immovable sardonic, humorous eye noting the decline of men and things and Somes hurried ever constitutionally uneasy beneath his cousin's glance George, who, as he had heard had written a letter signed to Patriot in the middle of the war complaining of the government's hysteria in docking the oats of race-horses yes, there he was tall, ponderous, neat clean shaven with his smooth hair, hardly thin smelling, no doubt, of the best hair-wash and a pink paper in his hand well, he didn't change and for perhaps the first time in his life Somes felt a kind of sympathy tapping in his waistcoat for that sardonic kinsman with his weight, his perfectly parted hair and bull-like gaze he was a guarantee that the old order would take some shifting yet he saw George move the pink paper as if inviting him to ascend the chap must want to ask something about his property it was still under Somes' control for in the adoption of a sleeping partnership at that painful period twenty years back when he had divorced Irene Somes had found himself almost insensibly retaining control of all purely foresight affairs hesitating for just a moment he nodded and went in since the death of his brother-in-law Montague-Darty in Paris which no one had quite known what to make of but it was certainly not suicide the Aseum Club had seemed more respectable to Somes George too he knew had sown the last of his wild oats and was committed definitely to the joys of the table eating only of the very best so as to keep his weight down and owning as he said just one or two old screws to give me an interest in life he joined his cousin therefore in the bay window without the embarrassing sense of indiscretion he had been used to feel George put out a well-kept hand haven't seen you since the war he said how's your wife thanks said Somes coldly well enough some hidden jest curbed for a moment George's fleshy face and gloated from his eye that Belgian chap profaned he said is a member here now he's a Rome customer quite muttered Somes what did you want to see me about old Timothy he might go off the hooks at any moment I suppose he's made his will yes well you are somebody ought to give him a look up last of the old lot he's a hundred you know they say he's like a rummy where you going to put him he ought to have a pyramid by rights Somes shook his head Highgate the family vault well I suppose the old girls would miss him if he was anywhere else they say he still takes an interest in food he might last on you know don't we get anything for the old four sites ten of them average age eighty-eight I worked it out that ought to be equal to triplets is that all said Somes I must be getting on you unsociable devil George's eye seem to answer yes that's all look him up in his mausoleum the old chap might want to prophesy the grin died on the rich curves of his face and he added haven't you attorneys invented a way yet of dodging this damned income tax it hits the fixed inheritance income like the very deuce I used to have two thousand five hundred a year now I've got a beggarly fifteen hundred and the price of living doubled ah murmured Somes the turf sin danger over George's face moved a gleam of sardonic self-defense well he said they brought me up to do nothing and here I am in the seer in yellow getting poorer every day these labor chaps mean to have the lot before they've done what are you going to do for a living when it comes I shall work a six hour day teaching politicians how to see a joke take my tips Somes go into parliament make sure of your four hundred and employ me and as Somes retired he resumed his seat in the bay window Somes moved along Piccadilly deep in reflections excited by his cousin's words he himself had always been a worker and a saver George always a drone and a spender and yet if confiscation once began it was he the worker and the saver who would be looted that was a negation of all virtue the overturning of all foresight principles could civilization be built on any other he did not think so well they wouldn't confiscate his pictures for they wouldn't know their worth but what would they be worth if these maniacs once began to milk capital a drug on the market I don't care about my selfie thought I could live on five hundred a year and never know the difference at my age but floor this fortune so widely invested these treasures so carefully chosen in a mast were all for her and if it should turn out that he couldn't give or leave them to her well life had no meaning and what was the use of going in to look at this crazy futuristic stuff with the view of seeing whether it had any future arriving at the gallery off cork street however he paid his shilling picked up a catalog and entered some ten persons were prowling round Somes took steps and came on what looked to him like a lamppost bent by collision after Omnibus it was advanced some three paces from the wall and was described in his catalog as Jupiter he examined it with curiosity having recently turned some of his attention to sculpture if that's Jupiter he thought I wonder what Juno's like and suddenly he saw her opposite she appeared to him like nothing so much as a pump with two handles lightly clad in snow he was still gazing at her when two of the prowlers halted on his left epitent he heard one say jargon growled Somes to himself the other's boyish voice replied missed it old bean he's pulling your leg when Joven Juno created he them he was saying I'll see how much these fools will swallow and they've lapped up the lot you young duffer Silvich is an innovator don't you see that he's brought satire into sculpture the future of plastic art of music painting and even architecture has set in satiric it was bound to people are tired the bottoms tumbled out of sentiment while I'm quite equal to taking a little interest in beauty I was through the war you've dropped your handkerchief sir Somes saw a handkerchief held out in front of him he took it with some natural suspicion and approached it to his nose it had the right scent of distant o-day cologne in his initials in a corner slightly reassured he raised his eyes to the young man's face it had rather fawn-like ears a laughing mouth with half a toothbrush growing out of it on each side and small lively eyes above a normally dressed appearance thank you he said and moved by a sort of irritation added glad to hear you like beauty that's rare nowadays I don't on it said the young man but you and I are the last of the old guards sir Somes smiled if you really care for pictures he said here's my card I can show you some quite good ones any Sunday if you're down the river and care to look in awfully nice of you sir I'll drop in like a bird my name's Mont Michael and he took off his hat Somes already regretting his impulse raised his own slightly in response with a downward look at the young man's companion who had a purple tie dreadful little slug-like whiskers and a scornful look as if you were a poet it was the first indiscretion he had committed for so long that he went and sat down in an alcove what had possessed him to give his card to a rackety young fellow who went about with a thing like that and Fleur always at the back of his started out like a filigree figure from a clock when the hour strikes on the screen opposite the alcove was a large canvas with a great mini-square tomato-colored blobs on it and nothing else so far as Somes could see from where he sat he looked at his catalog number 32 the future town, Paul Post I suppose that satiric too he thought what a thing but his second impulse was more cautious it did not do to condemn hurriedly there had been those stripey streaky creations of Monet's which had turned out such trumps and then the stippled school and Gauguin why even since the post-impressionist there had been one or two painters not to be sneezed at during the 38 years of his connoisseur's life indeed he had marked so many movements seeing the tides of taste and technique so ebb and flow that there was really no telling anything except that there was money to be made out of every change of fashion this too might quite well be a case where one must subdue primordial instinct or lose the market he got up and stood before the picture trying hard to see it with the eyes of other people above the tomato blobs was what he took to be a sunset till someone passing said he's got the airplanes wonderfully don't you think below the tomato blobs was a band of white vertical black stripes to which he could assign no meaning whatever till someone else came by murmuring what expression he gets with his foreground expression of what some went back to his seat the thing was rich as his father would have said and he wouldn't give a damn for it expression ah they were all expressionist now he had heard on the continent so it was coming here too was it he remembered the first wave of influenza in 1887 or eight hatched in China so they said he wondered where this this expressionism had been hatched the thing was a regular disease he had become conscious of a woman in a youth standing between him and the future town their backs returned but very suddenly songs put his catalog before his face and drawing his hat forward gazed through the slip between no mistaking that back elegant as ever though the hair above had gone gray irony his divorced wife irony and this no doubt was her son by that fellow jolly in foresight their boy six months older than his own girl and mumbling over in his mind the bitter days of his divorce he rose to get out of sight but quickly sat down again she had turned her head to speak to her boy her profile was still so youthful that it made her gray hair seem powdery as a fancy dressed and her lips were smiling as soams first possessor of them had never seen them smile grudgingly he admitted her still beautiful and in a figure almost as young as ever and how that boy smiled back at her emotion squeezed soams his heart the sight infringed his sense of justice he grudged her that boy's smile it went beyond what flora gave him and it was undeserved their son might have been his son flora might have been her daughter if she had kept straight he lowered his catalogue if she saw him all the better reminder of her conduct in the presence of her son who probably knew nothing of it would be a salutary touch from the finger of that nemesis which surely must soon or late visit her then half conscious that such a thought was extravagant for a foresight of his age soams took out his watch past four flora was late she had gone to his niece image in cardigans and there they would keep her smoking cigarettes and gossiping in that he heard the boy laugh and say eagerly I say mum is this by one of anti june's lame ducks paul post I believe it is darling the word produced a little shock in soams he had never heard her use it and then she saw him his eyes must have had in them something of george foresight sardonic look for her gloved hand crisp the folds of her frock her eyebrows rose her face went stony she moved on it is a caution said the boy catching her arm again soams stared after them that boy was good looking with a foresight chin and eyes deep gray deep in but with something sunny like a glass of old cherry spill over him his smile perhaps his hair better than they deserved those two they passed from his view into the next room and soams continued to regard the future town but saw it not a little smile snarled up his lips he was despising the vehemence of his own feelings after all these years ghosts and yet as one grew old was there anything but what was ghosts like left yes there was floor he fixed his eyes on the entrance she was due but she would keep him waiting of course and suddenly he became aware of a sort of human breeze a short slight form clad in a sea green jibba with a metal belt and a fillet binding unruly red gold hair all streaked with gray she was talking to the gallery attendants and something familiar riveted his gaze in her eyes her chin her hair her spirit something which suggested a thin sky terrier just before its dinner surely june foresight his cousin june and coming straight to his recess she sat down beside him deep in thought took out a tablet and made a pencil note some sat unmoving a confounded thing cousinship disgusting he heard her murmur then as if resenting the presence of an overhearing stranger she looked at him the worst had happened soams soams turned his head very little how are you he said haven't seen you for twenty years no whatever made you come here my sins said soams what stuff stuff oh yes of course it hasn't arrived yet it never will said soams it must be making a dead loss of course it is how do you know it's my gallery soams sniffed from sheer surprise yours what on earth makes you run a show like this I don't treat art as if it were grocery soams pointed to the future town look at that who's going to live in a town like that or with it on his walls june contemplated the picture for a moment it's a vision she said the deuce there was silence then june rose crazy looking creature he thought well he said you'll find your young stepbrother here with a woman I used to know if you take my advice you'll close this exhibition june looked back at him oh you foresight she said and moved on about her light flyaway figure passing so suddenly away was a look of dangerous decisions foresight of course he was a foresight and so was she but from the time when as a mere girl she brought the city into his life to wreck it he had never hit it off with june and never would and here she was unmarried to this day owning a gallery and suddenly it came to soams how little he knew now of his own family the old aunts at timothy's had been dead so many years there was no clearing house for news what had they all done in the war young rogers boy had been wounded st. john hayman's second son killed young nicolas eldest had got an ob e or whatever they gave them they had all joined up somehow he believed that boy of joelians and ironies he supposed had been too young his own generation of course too old though giles hayman had driven a car for the red cross and jesse hayman been a special constable those dromeos had always been of a sporting type as for himself he had given a motor ambulance read the papers till he was sick of them passed through much anxiety bought no clothes lost seven pounds in weight he didn't know what more he could have done at his age indeed thinking it over it struck him that he and his family had taken this war very differently to that affair with the bores which had been supposed to tax all the resources of the empire in that old war of course his nephew val darty had been wounded that fellow joelians first son had died of enteric the dromeos had gone out on horses and june had been a nurse but all that had seemed in the nature of a portent while in this war everybody had done their bit so far as he could make out as a matter of course it seemed to show the growth of something or other or perhaps the decline of something else had the foresight to become less individual or more imperial or less provincial or was it simply that one hated germans why didn't flor come so that he could get away he saw those three return together from the other room and pass back along the far side of the screen the boy was standing before the juno now and suddenly on the other side of her some saw his daughter with eyebrows raised as well they might be he could see her eyes glint sideways the boy and the boy look back at her then Irene slipped her hand through his arm and drew him on some saw him glancing round and flor looking after them as the three went out a voice said cheerfully bit thick isn't it sir the young man who had handed him his handkerchief was again passing some's nodded I don't know what we're coming to oh that's all right sir answered the young man cheerfully they don't either flor's voice said hello father here you are precisely as if he'd been keeping her waiting the young man snatching off his hat passed on well said some's looking her up and down you're a punctual sort of young woman this treasured possession of his life was of medium height and color with short dark chestnut hair her wide apart brown eyes were said in white so clear that they glinted when they moved and yet in repose were almost dreamy under very white black lashed lids held over them in a sort of suspense she had a charming profile and nothing her father in her face save a decided chin aware that his expression was softening as he looked at her some's frowned to preserve the unemotionalism proper to a foresight he knew she was only too inclined to take advantage of his weakness slipping her hand under his arm she said who was that he picked up my handkerchief we talked about the pictures you're not going to buy that father no said some's grimly nor that Juno you've been looking at floor drag that his arm oh let's go it's a ghastly show in the doorway they passed the young man called Mont and his partner but some's had hung out a board marked that the passers will be prosecuted and he barely acknowledged the young fellow's salute well he said in the street whom did you meet at Imogen's aunt went afraid in that monsure profound oh muttered some's that chap what does your aunt see in him I don't know he looks pretty deep others said she likes him some's grunted cousin Val and his wife were there too what said some's I thought they were back in South Africa oh no they've sold their farm cousin Val was going to train race horses on the Sussex Downs they've got a jolly old manor house they asked me down there some's coughed the news was distasteful to him what's his wife like now very quiet but nice I think some's coughed again he's a rackety chap your cousin Val oh no father they're awfully devoted I promise to go Saturday to Wednesday next training race horses said some's it was extravagant but not the reason for his distaste why the deuce couldn't his nephew have stayed out in South Africa his own divorce had been bad enough without his nephew's marriage to the daughter of the correspondent a half sister to of June and of that boy whom Fleur had just been looking at from under the pump handle if he didn't look out she would come to know all about that old disgrace unpleasant things they were round him this afternoon like a swarm of bees I don't like it he said I want to see the race horses remembered Fleur and they've promised I shall ride cousin Val can't walk much you know but he can ride perfectly he's going to show me their gallops racing said some's it's a pity the war didn't knock that on the head he's taking after his father I'm afraid I don't know anything about his father no said some's grimly he took an interest in horses and broke his neck in Paris walking downstairs good riddance for your aunt he frowned recollecting the inquiry into those stairs which he had attended in Paris six years ago because Montague Darty could not attended himself perfectly normal stairs in a house where they played Baccarat either his winnings or the way he had celebrated them had gone to his brother in law's head the French procedure had been very loose he had had a lot of trouble with it a sound from Fleur distracted his attention look the people who were in the gallery with us what people muttered some's who knew perfectly well I think that woman's beautiful come into this pastry cook said some's abruptly and tightening his grip on her arm he turned into a confectioner's it was for him a surprising thing to do and he said rather anxiously what will you have oh I don't want anything I had a cocktail on a tremendous lunch we must have something now we're here muttered some's keeping hold of her arm two teas he said and two of those nugget things but no sooner was his body seated than his soul sprang up those three those three were coming in he heard Irene say something to her boy and his answer oh no mom this place is all right my stunt and the three sat down at that moment most awkward of his existence prided with ghosts and shadows from his past in presence of the only two women he had ever loved his divorced wife and his daughter by her successor some's was not so much afraid of them as of his cousin June she might make a scene she might introduce those two children to a bowl of anything he bit too hastily at the nugget and it stuck to his plate working at it with his finger he glanced at Fleur she was masticating dreamily but her eyes were on the boy the foresight in him said think, feel, and you're done for and he wiggled his finger desperately plate, did Jolian wear a plate? did that woman wear a plate? time had been when he had seen her wearing nothing that was something anyway which had never been stolen from him and she knew it though she might sit there calm and self-possessed as if she had never been his wife an acid humor stirred in his foresight blood a subtle pain divided by hair's breath from pleasure if only June did not suddenly bring her hornets about his ears the boy was talking of course Auntie June so he called his half-sister Auntie did he thought she must be fifty if she was a day it's jolly good of you to encourage them only hang it all some stole a glance Irene's startled eyes were bent watchfully on her boy she, she had these devotions for Bessini for that boy's father, for this boy he touched Fleur's arm and said well, if you had enough one more father, please she would be sick he went to the counter to pay when he turned round again he saw Fleur standing near the door holding a handkerchief which the boy had evidently just handed to her F F he heard her say Fleur foresight, it's mine all right thank you ever so good God she had caught the trick from what he told her in the gallery, monkey foresight why that's my name too perhaps we're cousins really, we must be there aren't any others I live at Maple Durham, where do you Robin Hill question and answer had been so rapid that all was over before he could lift a finger he saw Irene's face alive with startled feeling gave the slightest shake of his head and slipped his arm through Fleur's come along he said she did not move didn't you hear father isn't it queer, our names the same are we cousins what he said, foresight distant perhaps my name's Jolie and sir John for short oh ah said Zomes yes distant how are you, very good of you, goodbye he moved on thanks awfully Fleur was saying au revoir au revoir he heard the boy reply end of part one chapter one by Leanne Howlett part one chapter two of To Let this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Andy Minter the foresight saga three To Let part one chapter two fine Fleur foresight emerging from the pastry cooks Zomes' first impulse was to vent his nerves by saying to his daughter dropping your handkerchief to which her reply might well be I picked that up from you his second impulse therefore was to let sleeping dogs lie but she would surely question him he gave her a side long look and found she was giving him the same she said softly why don't you like those cousins, father? Zomes lifted the corner of his lip what made you think that? c'est la sa voire that sees itself what a way of putting it after twenty years of a French wife Zomes had still little sympathy with her language a theatrical affair and connected in his mind with domestic irony how? he asked you must know them and you didn't make a sign I saw them looking at you I've never seen the boy in my life replied Zomes with perfect truth no, but you've seen the others dear Zomes gave her another look what had she picked up had her aunt Winifred or Imogen or Val Darty and his wife been talking every breath of the old scandal had been carefully kept from her at home and Winifred warned many times that he wouldn't have a whisper of it reach her for the world so far as she ought to know he had never been married before but her dark eyes whose southern glint and clearness often almost frightened him met his with perfect innocence well, he said your grandfather and his brother had a quarrel the two families don't know each other how romantic now, what does she mean by that he thought the word was to him extravagant and dangerous it was if she had said how jolly and they'll continue not to know each other he added but instantly regretted the challenge in those words Fleur was smiling in this age when young people prided themselves on going their own ways in relation to any sort of decent prejudice he had said the very thing to excite her willfulness then, recalling the expression on Irene's face, he breathed again what sort of quarrel he heard Fleur say about a house it's ancient history for you your grandfather died the day you were born he was ninety ninety? are there many foresight besides those in the red book I don't know they're all dispersed now the old ones are dead except Timothy Fleur clasped her hands Timothy isn't that delicious not at all said Soames it offended him that she should think Timothy, delicious a kind of insult to his breed this new generation mocked at anything solid and tenacious you go and see the old boy he might want to prophesy ah, if Timothy could see the disquiet England of his great nephews and great nieces he would certainly give tongue and involuntarily he glanced up at the icium yes, George was still in the window with the same pink paper in his hand where is Robin Hill, father? Robin Hill Robin Hill round which all that tragedy had centered what did she want to know for in Surrey, he muttered not far from Richmond, why is the house there? what house? that they quarreled about yes, but what's all that to do with you, we're going home tomorrow you'd better be thinking about your frocks bless you, they're all thought about a family feud it's like the Bible or Mark Twain awfully exciting, what did you do in the feud, father? never you mind oh, but if I'm to keep it up who said you were to keep it up I said it had nothing to do with you that's just what I think, you know so that's all right she was too sharp for him fine as Annette sometimes called her nothing for it but to distract her attention there's a bit of Rosalind Point in here he said, stopping before a shop that I thought you might like when he had paid for it and they had resumed their progress, Fleur said don't you think that boy's mother is the most beautiful woman of her age you've ever seen Soames shivered, uncanny the way she stuck to it I don't know that I noticed her dear, I saw the corner of your eye you'll see everything and a great deal more it seems to me what's her husband like he must be your first cousin if your fathers were brothers dead for all I know said Soames with sudden vehemence I haven't seen him for twenty years what was he painter that's quite jolly the words if you want to please me you'll put those people out of your head sprang to Soames' lips but he choked them back he must not let her see his feelings he once insulted me he said her quick eyes rested on his face I see you didn't avenge it and it rankles you let me have a go it was really like lying in the dark with a mosquito hovering above his face such pertinacity in Fleur was new to him and as they reached the hotel he said grimly I did my best and that's enough about these people I'm going up till dinner I shall sit here with a parting look at her extended in a chair a look half resentful half adoring Soames moved into the lift and was transported to their suite on the fourth floor he stood by the window of the sitting-room which gave view over Hyde Park and drummed a finger on its pain his feelings were confused techy, troubled the throb of that old wound scarred over by time and new interests was mingled with displeasure and anxiety and a slight pain in his chest where that nougat stuff had disagreed had a net come in but she was any good to him in such a difficulty whenever she had questioned him about his first marriage he had always shut her up she knew nothing of it save as it had been the great passion of his life and his marriage with herself but domestic makeshift she had always kept the grudge of that up her sleeve as it were and used it commercially he listened the sound, the vague murmur of a woman's movements was coming through the door she was in he tapped I said soams she had been changing her frock and was still imperfectly clothed a striking figure before her glass there was a certain magnificence about her arms, shoulders, hair which had darkened since he first knew her about the turn of her neck the silkiness of her garments her dark-lashed grey-blue eyes she was certainly as handsome at forty as she had ever been a fine possession an excellent housekeeper a sensible and affectionate enough mother if only she weren't always so frankly cynical about the relations between them soams, who had no more real affection for her than she had for him suffered from a kind of English grievance in that she had never dropped even the thinnest veil of sentiment over their partnership like most of his countrymen and women he held the view that marriage should be based on mutual love but though when from a marriage love had disappeared or been found never to have really existed so that it was manifestly not based on love you must not admit it there it was and the love was not but there you were and must continue to be thus you had it both ways and were not tarred with cynicism realism and immorality like the French moreover it was necessary in the interest of property he knew that she knew that they both knew that there was no love between them but he still expected her not to admit in words or conduct such a thing and he could never understand what she meant when she talked of the hypocrisy of the English he said who have you got at the shelter next week Annette went on touching her lips delicately with salve he always wished she wouldn't do that your sister Winifred and the Cardigans she took up a tiny stick of black and prospered her form that Belgian chap my him Annette turned her neck lazily touched one eyelash and said he amuses Winifred I want someone to amuse Fleur she's restive restive repeated Annette this time you see that my friend she was born restive as you call it would she never get that affected role out of her arse he touched the dress she had taken off and asked what have you been doing Annette looked at him reflected in her glass her just brightened lips smiled rather full rather ironical enjoying myself she said she said it was his word for all that incomprehensible running in and out of shops that women went in for as Fleur got her summer dresses you don't ask if I have mine you don't care whether I do or not why try it well she has and I have mine terribly expensive hmm said Soames Annette chapped profond due in England Annette raised the eyebrows she had just finished he yachts ah said Soames he's a sleepy chap and sometimes answered Annette and her face had a sort of quiet enjoyment but sometimes very amusing he's got a touch of the tar brush about him Annette stretched herself tar blush she said what is that his mother was Armenian that's it then muttered Soames does he know anything about pictures he knows about everything a man of the world well get someone for Fleur I want to distract her she's going off on Saturday to Val d'Arta in his wife I don't like it why not since the reason could not be explained without going into family history she merely answered racketing about there's too much of it I like that little Mrs. Val she's very quiet and clever I know nothing of her except this thing's new and Soames took up a creation from the bed Annette received it from him would you hook me she said Soames hooked glancing once over her shoulder into the glass he saw the expression on her face faintly contemptuous as much as to say thanks you will never learn no thank God he wasn't a Frenchman he finished with a jerk and the words it's too low here and he went to the door with the wish to get away from her and go down to Fleur again Annette stayed a powder puff and said the startling suddenness he knew the expression he had reason to the first time she had used it he thought it meant what a grosser you are and had not known whether to be relieved or not when better informed he resented the word he was not coarse if he was coarse what was that chap in the room beyond his who made those horrible noises in the morning when he cleared his throat or those people in the lounge who thought it well bred to say nothing but what the whole world could hear and what humanity coarse because he had said her dress was low well so it was he went out without reply coming into the lounge from the far end he had once saw Fleur where he had left her she sat with crossed knees slowly balancing a foot in silk stocking and grey shoe sure sign that she was dreaming her eyes showed it too they went off like that sometimes and then in a moment she would come to life and be as quick and restless as a monkey and she knew so much so self assured and not yet 19 what was that odious word flapper dreadful young creatures squealing and squawking and showing their legs the worst of them bad dreams the best of them powdered angels Fleur was not a flapper not one of those slangy ill bred young females and yet she was frighteningly self-willed and full of life and determined to enjoy it enjoy the word brought no Puritan but it brought the terror suited to his temperament he had always been afraid to enjoy today for fear that he might not enjoy tomorrow so much and it was terrifying to feel that his daughter was divested of that safeguard the very way she sat in and that chair showed it lost in her dream he had never been lost in a dream himself there was nothing to be had out of it and where she had got it from he did not know certainly not from Annette and yet Annette as a young girl when he was hanging about her had once had a flowery look well she had lost it now Fleur rose from her chair swiftly restlessly and flung herself down at a writing table seizing ink and writing paper she began to write as if she had not time to breathe before she got her letter written and suddenly she saw him the air of desperate absorption vanished she smiled waved a kiss made a pretty face as if she were a little puzzled and a little bored ah she was fine fine end of part one chapter two