There are very few unmarried ladies going about, you know. It’s not a state that lasts very long with pretty women.”
“My aunt Emily doesn’t approve of people getting engaged whenthey are married. My mother is always doing it and it makes Aunt Emily very cross.”
“You must tell your dear Aunt Emily that in many ways it is rather convenient. But all the same, she is quite right. I have been a fiancé too often and for too long and now it is time I was married.”
“Do you want to be?”
“I am not so sure. Going out to dinner every night with the same person, this must be terrible.”
“You might stay in?”
“To break the habit of a life time is rather terrible, too. The fact is, I am so accustomed now to the engaged state that it’s hard to imagine anything different.”
“But have you been engaged to other people before this one?”
“Many, many times,” he admitted.
“So what happened to them all?”
“Various unmentionable fates.”
“For instance, what happened to the last one before this?”
“Let me see. Ah, yes—the last one before this did something I couldn’t approve of, so I stopped loving her.”
“But can you stop loving people because they do things you don’t approve of?”
“Yes, I can.”
“What a lucky talent,” I said. “I’m sure I couldn’t.”
We had come to the end of the avenue and before us lay a field of stubble. The sun’s rays were now beginning to pour down and dissolve the blue mist, turning the trees, the stubble and a group of ricks into objects of gold. I thought how lucky I was to be enjoying such a beautiful moment with so exactly the right person and that this was something I should remember all my life. The Duke interrupted these sentimental reflections, saying:
“Behold how brightly breaks the morning
Though bleak our lot our hearts are warm.…
Am I not a perfect mine of quotations? Tell me, who is Veronica’s lover now?”
I was once more obliged to confess that I had not known Veronica before, and I knew nothing of her life. He seemed less astounded by this news than Roly had been, but looked at me reflectively, saying, “You are very young. You have something of your mother. At first I thought not, but now I see there is something.”
“And who do you think Mrs. Chaddesley Corbett’s lover is?” I said. I was more interested in her than in my mother at the moment, and, besides, all this talk about lovers intoxicated me. One knew of course that they existed, because of the Duke of Monmouth, and so on, but so near, under the very same roof as oneself, that was indeed exciting.
“It doesn’t make a pin of difference,” he said, “who it is. She lives, as all those sort of women do, in one little tiny group or set, and sooner or later everybody in that set becomes the lover of everybody else, so that when they change their lovers it is more like a cabinet reshuffle than a new government. Always chosen out of the same old lot, you see.”
“Is it like that in France?” I said.
“With society people? Just the same all over the world, though in France I should say there is less reshuffling on the whole than in England; the ministers stay longer in their posts.”
“Why?”
“Why? Frenchwomen generally keep their lovers if they want to because they know that there is one infallible way of doing so.”
“No!” I said. “Oh, do tell.”
I was more fascinated by this conversation every minute.
“It’s very simple. You must give way to them in every respect.”
“Goodness!” I said, thinking hard.
“Now, you see, these English
femmes du monde
, these Veronicas and Sheilas and Brendas and your mother, too, though nobody could say she stays in one little set—if she had done that she would not be so déclassée—they follow quite a different plan. They are proud and distant, out when the telephone bell rings, not free to dine, unless you ask them a week before; in short,
elles cherchent à
se faire valoir
, and
“My aunt Emily doesn’t approve of people getting engaged whenthey are married. My mother is always doing it and it makes Aunt Emily very cross.”
“You must tell your dear Aunt Emily that in many ways it is rather convenient. But all the same, she is quite right. I have been a fiancé too often and for too long and now it is time I was married.”
“Do you want to be?”
“I am not so sure. Going out to dinner every night with the same person, this must be terrible.”
“You might stay in?”
“To break the habit of a life time is rather terrible, too. The fact is, I am so accustomed now to the engaged state that it’s hard to imagine anything different.”
“But have you been engaged to other people before this one?”
“Many, many times,” he admitted.
“So what happened to them all?”
“Various unmentionable fates.”
“For instance, what happened to the last one before this?”
“Let me see. Ah, yes—the last one before this did something I couldn’t approve of, so I stopped loving her.”
“But can you stop loving people because they do things you don’t approve of?”
“Yes, I can.”
“What a lucky talent,” I said. “I’m sure I couldn’t.”
We had come to the end of the avenue and before us lay a field of stubble. The sun’s rays were now beginning to pour down and dissolve the blue mist, turning the trees, the stubble and a group of ricks into objects of gold. I thought how lucky I was to be enjoying such a beautiful moment with so exactly the right person and that this was something I should remember all my life. The Duke interrupted these sentimental reflections, saying:
“Behold how brightly breaks the morning
Though bleak our lot our hearts are warm.…
Am I not a perfect mine of quotations? Tell me, who is Veronica’s lover now?”
I was once more obliged to confess that I had not known Veronica before, and I knew nothing of her life. He seemed less astounded by this news than Roly had been, but looked at me reflectively, saying, “You are very young. You have something of your mother. At first I thought not, but now I see there is something.”
“And who do you think Mrs. Chaddesley Corbett’s lover is?” I said. I was more interested in her than in my mother at the moment, and, besides, all this talk about lovers intoxicated me. One knew of course that they existed, because of the Duke of Monmouth, and so on, but so near, under the very same roof as oneself, that was indeed exciting.
“It doesn’t make a pin of difference,” he said, “who it is. She lives, as all those sort of women do, in one little tiny group or set, and sooner or later everybody in that set becomes the lover of everybody else, so that when they change their lovers it is more like a cabinet reshuffle than a new government. Always chosen out of the same old lot, you see.”
“Is it like that in France?” I said.
“With society people? Just the same all over the world, though in France I should say there is less reshuffling on the whole than in England; the ministers stay longer in their posts.”
“Why?”
“Why? Frenchwomen generally keep their lovers if they want to because they know that there is one infallible way of doing so.”
“No!” I said. “Oh, do tell.”
I was more fascinated by this conversation every minute.
“It’s very simple. You must give way to them in every respect.”
“Goodness!” I said, thinking hard.
“Now, you see, these English
femmes du monde
, these Veronicas and Sheilas and Brendas and your mother, too, though nobody could say she stays in one little set—if she had done that she would not be so déclassée—they follow quite a different plan. They are proud and distant, out when the telephone bell rings, not free to dine, unless you ask them a week before; in short,
elles cherchent à
se faire valoir
, and
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