of London early on Saturday, ‘but would you consider yourself some kind of aristocrat?’
‘America is by no remote stretch of the imagination a classless society,’ I said, ‘and yes, certainly I’m an aristocrat. I realize, of course, that by your standards I’m nothing but an unwashed upstart, but I do have a modest family tree.’
My chauffeur was at the wheel of a long immaculate dark green Lanchester Forty, and Dinah and I were lounging in the back. I was, I considered, admirably dressed for my weekend in the country. It was a little late in the year for tweeds so I wore a pair of new grey sporting flannels, a soft shirt and an Oxford blue blazer. My front strand of hair, bewildered by my boater, was clamped sulkily to the top of my head, and my feet reclined in luxury in a pair of shoes which had been delivered the previous morning from Jermyn Street. I had already decided before leaving the house that I looked smart enough to pass for forty.
Beside me Dinah wore her shabby grey skirt, a yellow blouse and a mackintosh which looked as if it had been left over from the war. Apart from the chauffeur we were alone in the car. Peterson, O’Reilly and Dawson my valet were following behind with the luggage in the Rolls-Royce.
‘I didn’t think Americans cared about family trees,’ said Dinah as we glided through the ugly suburbs of North London towards the meadows of Essex.
‘There are many different kinds of American. My kind cares.’
‘But what is your kind? I’m sorry, but after all you
are
a foreigner and I can’t seem to attach you to any sort of familiar background.’
‘How nice to find you’re as insular and snobbish as all the best socialists! I was raised among the Anglo-Saxon protestant hierarchy of the EasternSeaboard, a sect known as the Yankees and bearing a vague bastard resemblance to the English. They hide their ruthless pragmatism behind a social code which includes such masterly maxims as: “Be loyal always to your class,” and: “Do business with anyone but go yachting only with gentlemen.” They are clever and industrious and when rich and powerful can be extremely dangerous. They are a small elite minority who run America, and they run it through the great investment banks of Wall Street which control the country’s capital.’
‘Banks like your bank?’
‘Banks like my bank. I’m afraid, my dear, that I’m just another Yankee capitalist arch-villain hiding behind my venerable Dutch name.’
She asked me about my family, so I told her how Cornelius Van Zyl had sailed to America from Scheveningen in 1640 to become a citizen of Nieuw Amsterdam.
‘Subsequent Cornelius Van Zales were large landowners in what is now Westchester County,’ I added, ‘and intermarried with the British to such an extent that I fear I’ve inherited nothing Dutch but my name. This explains, of course, my natural inclination to villainy while always pleading for fair play and good sportsmanship, and my natural inclination has been reinforced a hundredfold by having been born a New Yorker.’
She wanted me to describe New York, but I merely told her that it was like a European city which one could never quite identify. ‘How strange it is to think of it now,’ I said, glancing at the Essex fields, ‘far out there in the west, roaring along in its separate furrow—’
I stopped. It was then that I first suspected I had begun my journey sideways in time.
The sun shone steadily, and although I still found the air cool Dinah periodically took off her hat and hung out of the window to let the breeze stream through her hair. The Lanchester was running faultlessly and whenever we passed through a village the inhabitants gaped at its splendour. I wished I could have dispensed with the chauffeur and driven the motor car myself, but in view of my health that was out of the question.
The countryside was pleasant but not spectacular, and the fields were as neat as fields can only be in land which
‘America is by no remote stretch of the imagination a classless society,’ I said, ‘and yes, certainly I’m an aristocrat. I realize, of course, that by your standards I’m nothing but an unwashed upstart, but I do have a modest family tree.’
My chauffeur was at the wheel of a long immaculate dark green Lanchester Forty, and Dinah and I were lounging in the back. I was, I considered, admirably dressed for my weekend in the country. It was a little late in the year for tweeds so I wore a pair of new grey sporting flannels, a soft shirt and an Oxford blue blazer. My front strand of hair, bewildered by my boater, was clamped sulkily to the top of my head, and my feet reclined in luxury in a pair of shoes which had been delivered the previous morning from Jermyn Street. I had already decided before leaving the house that I looked smart enough to pass for forty.
Beside me Dinah wore her shabby grey skirt, a yellow blouse and a mackintosh which looked as if it had been left over from the war. Apart from the chauffeur we were alone in the car. Peterson, O’Reilly and Dawson my valet were following behind with the luggage in the Rolls-Royce.
‘I didn’t think Americans cared about family trees,’ said Dinah as we glided through the ugly suburbs of North London towards the meadows of Essex.
‘There are many different kinds of American. My kind cares.’
‘But what is your kind? I’m sorry, but after all you
are
a foreigner and I can’t seem to attach you to any sort of familiar background.’
‘How nice to find you’re as insular and snobbish as all the best socialists! I was raised among the Anglo-Saxon protestant hierarchy of the EasternSeaboard, a sect known as the Yankees and bearing a vague bastard resemblance to the English. They hide their ruthless pragmatism behind a social code which includes such masterly maxims as: “Be loyal always to your class,” and: “Do business with anyone but go yachting only with gentlemen.” They are clever and industrious and when rich and powerful can be extremely dangerous. They are a small elite minority who run America, and they run it through the great investment banks of Wall Street which control the country’s capital.’
‘Banks like your bank?’
‘Banks like my bank. I’m afraid, my dear, that I’m just another Yankee capitalist arch-villain hiding behind my venerable Dutch name.’
She asked me about my family, so I told her how Cornelius Van Zyl had sailed to America from Scheveningen in 1640 to become a citizen of Nieuw Amsterdam.
‘Subsequent Cornelius Van Zales were large landowners in what is now Westchester County,’ I added, ‘and intermarried with the British to such an extent that I fear I’ve inherited nothing Dutch but my name. This explains, of course, my natural inclination to villainy while always pleading for fair play and good sportsmanship, and my natural inclination has been reinforced a hundredfold by having been born a New Yorker.’
She wanted me to describe New York, but I merely told her that it was like a European city which one could never quite identify. ‘How strange it is to think of it now,’ I said, glancing at the Essex fields, ‘far out there in the west, roaring along in its separate furrow—’
I stopped. It was then that I first suspected I had begun my journey sideways in time.
The sun shone steadily, and although I still found the air cool Dinah periodically took off her hat and hung out of the window to let the breeze stream through her hair. The Lanchester was running faultlessly and whenever we passed through a village the inhabitants gaped at its splendour. I wished I could have dispensed with the chauffeur and driven the motor car myself, but in view of my health that was out of the question.
The countryside was pleasant but not spectacular, and the fields were as neat as fields can only be in land which
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