What's Bred in the Bone Page 16

  In Adam’s Fall

  We sinned all.

  My grandmother worked that into a sampler when she was a girl, and we’ve still got it on the wall.”

  “All sinners, Victoria?”

  “All sinners, Frank, however your aunt throws scent over it with her religious pictures and fancy prayers. That’s just the R.C. way of deceiving yourself, as if life was a fancy-dress party, with purple socks, and all. Life isn’t just for fun, you know.”

  “But aren’t we ever to be happy?”

  “Show me the place in the Bible where it says we are to be happy in this world. Happiness for sinners means sin. You can’t get away from it.”

  “Are you a sinner, Victoria?”

  “Maybe the worst of sinners. How can I tell?”

  “Then why are you so good to the fellow upstairs?”

  “We sinners have to stick together, Frank, and do the best we can in our fallen state. That’s what religion is. I don’t make the judgements. For all the silver and thick carpets and hand-painted pictures—your pictures too, clever though they are—this is a House of Sin.”

  “But Victoria, that’s awful. And it isn’t an answer. If you’re a sinner, why don’t you sin?”

  “Too proud, Frank. God made me a sinner, and I can’t change that. But I don’t have to give in, even to Him, and I won’t. I won’t give it to Him to say. Though He slay me, yet will I worship Him. But I won’t throw in the towel, even if He’s damned me.”

  Thus, in addition to a little lukewarm Anglicanism, and much hot, sweet Catholicism, Frank imbibed a stern and unyielding Calvinism. It was no help with his personal difficulties. But he loved Victoria and he believed her, just as he believed Aunt. The only person who didn’t seem to have a God who was out for his scalp was Zadok.

  Zadok’s religion, if it may be so called, was summed up briefly. “Life’s a rum start, me little dear. I’ve good cause to know!”

  THE HOUSE OF SIN was, in its way, splendid, and Frank took satisfaction in its richness without having a clear idea of its ugliness. The drawing-room, so silvery blue, so crammed with uncomfortable “Louis” furniture, relieved only by the fierce mahogany gloss of the Phonoliszt, and the portly Victrola, repository of great music, including several records by the man-god Caruso. The dining-room, battleground of two great indigestions—Aunt’s manifesting itself in sternly repressed gas, and Grand’mère’s in a recurrent biliousness. Neither lady ever thought of moderating her diet. “I can take cream,” Aunt would say, as if many other luxuries were denied her; she took cream at every meal. “Oh, I shouldn’t, but I’ll venture,” was what Grand’mère would say, as she helped herself to another slice of Victoria’s superb pastry, usually manifesting itself as the casing of a sweet fruit pie. The dining-room, with its red velvety paper and its pictures of cardinals, seemed an outward enlargement of two outraged, overloaded stomachs. And then, Grand-père’s study, so complex and tormented in its panelling, where much the most interesting books were his many albums of sun-pictures. A House of Sin? Certainly a house of vexations and disappointments, quite apart from those that plagued Francis.

  Late on the night of Good Friday, when in deference to Mary-Ben and Marie-Louise the Senator had taken no wine at the salmon dinner (a day of abstention and fasting, you see), the Senator sat in the hideous study, refreshing himself with a little of his excellent bootleg whisky. A tap at the door, which opened just wide enough for Dr. Joseph Ambrosius Jerome to slip in, smiling widely but not mirthfully, as was usual with him.

  “Come in, Joe; I was hoping you’d look in. Will you take any spirits?”

  “In spite of the day, Hamish, I will. And I’d like a word with you about the fellow upstairs.”

  “No change?”

  “Just growing older, like the rest of us. You well know, Hamish, that I didn’t give him long, years ago, when we moved him up there. He’s proved me wrong.”

  “That was a bad decision, Joe.”

  “Don’t I know it! But you remember we went into all that, and decided for Mary-Jim’s sake, and the sake of the baby that was coming, it was the best we could do.”

  “Yes, but to pretend he had died! To pretend even to Mary-Jim! That awful pretended funeral—if Mick Devlin had known there was nothing in the coffin but some gravel he’d have had the hide off us both!”

  “We had the support of Marie-Louise and Mary-Ben; they were sure we were doing the best thing. Do they ever speak of it now?”

  “Not a word from either of them in years. Nobody goes up there but Victoria Cameron, and I believe Zadok, sometimes. I never go up. Can’t stand the sight of him. My grandson! Now why, Joe, why?”

  “Reasons better not gone into, Hamish.”

  “That’s not an answer. Have you any notion, yourself? What’s science got to say about it?”

  “Did you read the book I lent you?”

  “By that fellow Krafft-Ebing? I read some of it. When I read about the fellow who liked to eat his mistress’s earwax, b’God I thought I’d spew. You can take it away with you when you go. What’s all that got to do with Mary-Jacobine McRory, a beautiful, sweet-souled girl who got into a mess that might have happened to any girl, under the circumstances.”

  “Ah, but what were the circumstances? I told you at the time: go whoring after the English and a life of fashion, I said, and you’ll be a sorry man. And what are you today, and what have you been ever since? A sorry man.”

  “Oh, of course, Joe, we know you’re always right. And what has your rightness got you? You’re a cranky, half-crazy old bachelor, and my sister is a cranky, religious-crazy old maid, and however much you looked at her torn-off scalp you’d have been better together than the way you are now—which is together but tortured apart. So don’t preach to me.”

  “There, there, Hamish. Don’t let’s have any of your Hielan’man’s hysterics. It hasn’t been all bad. When last I saw Mary-Jim she look happy enough.”

  “Happy enough isn’t as happy as can be. Perhaps I was wrong. But I was trying to do the best for my child.”

  “God, Hamish, nobody can do the best for anyone. People can only rarely do the best for themselves. Mary-Jim’s not over-bright, but God knows she’s beautiful, and that entirely robbed you of good sense. Good intentions can make terrible mischief, but so long as love lasts, they’ll last, and there you are. You didn’t do too badly. You landed your Englishman.”

  “I wasn’t fishing for any Englishman! But she had to marry, and where in this place, or in Ottawa even, would there have been anybody good enough for her?”

  “The old problem of the rich Catholic girl: where is she to find a husband on her own level?”

  “I met some very fine Catholics in England.”

  “Very fine? Well-born, I suppose you mean, and rich and educated? And I’m not saying that doesn’t count for a lot. But you ended up with Cornish.”

  “And what’s so bad about Cornish?”

  “Oh, get away, Hamish! You know fine what’s wrong with Cornish. What about that paper he made you sign?”

  “He overreached me; I don’t say he didn’t. But he’s not turned out so badly. Listen, Joe, keep this under your hat, but there’s to be some interesting news soon of Cornish.”

  “What’s he up to now?”

  “It’s what he was up to all through the War. Working very much on the Q.T. and sometimes in serious danger, I understand. Well, when the next Honours List appears, he’ll be a K.B.E.—Sir Francis—and my girl will be Lady Cornish. What d’you think of that?”

  “I think I’m happy for you, Hamish, and for Mary-Jim. Maybe not so happy for Gerry O’Gorman and Mary-Tess. To lose one knighthood only to have another pop up in the same family won’t sit well with them.”

  “Oh, that was only a Papal knighthood; this is a far more solid thing.”

  “Hamish, you astonish me! ‘Only a Papal knighthood’! You’re beginning to sound almost like a Prot.”

  “In this country if you’re in the money
business you have to learn to sit at the table with the Prots. They have most of it their own way. R.C.s and Jews needn’t apply. And I’m thinking very hard about the money business.”

  “Surely you have all you need?”

  “What a man needs and what he wants may be very different things. Don’t forget, I came from very poor people, and the hatred of poverty is in my blood. Now listen: the lumbering business isn’t what is was; it’s changing, and I don’t want to change with it; I want something new.”

  “At your age?”

  “What about my age? I’m only sixty-seven. I’ve other people to think of. Now, you know that for years people—widows and old people and the like—have been coming to me and asking me to look after their money for them.”

  “And you’ve done it, and made money for them. For me, too.”

  “Yes, but I don’t like it. You trust me, and I’m pleased you do, but this thing of private trust is no way to do business; in business nobody should have total responsibility for anybody else’s money. So I’m thinking of unloading the lumber trade, and setting up one of these trust companies.”

  “In Blairlogie? Wouldn’t it be very small potatoes?”

  “No, not in Blairlogie. In Toronto.”

  “Toronto? Man, are you crazy? Why not Montreal, where the big money is?”

  “Because there’s other big money, and it’s in the West, and Toronto will be the centre for that. Not yet, but you have to be ahead of the procession.”

  “You’re away ahead of me.”

  “And properly so. Why wouldn’t I be? You’re a doctor and you look after my health; I’m a financier, and I look after your money.”

  “Well—when do you take the big step?”

  “I’ve taken it. Not many people know, but recent events are pushing me ahead fast. Gerry O’Gorman and Mary-Tess want to get out of Blairlogie; after that comedown over the Knight of St. Sylvester business they’re very much out of love with this little place. They’ll move to Toronto, and Gerry’ll set the thing on its feet.”

  “God! Is Gerry up to a big thing like that?”

  “Yes. Gerry has powers that have never been roused. And he’s honest.”

  “Honest! What about Blondie Utronki?”

  “Honest about money. Women are quite a different thing. And I’ve told Gerry there’s to be no more of that monkey-business, and Mary-Tess has him under her thumb forever. He can do it. Gerry has great ability as an organizer, and people like him.”

  “He’s no Prot.”

  “Not yet. But Gerry isn’t nearly as good a Catholic as he was before that little sanctified rat Beaudry did the dirty on him. Give him time, and give him Toronto, and we shall see what we shall see. Anyhow, that needn’t show too clearly. Didn’t I tell you Cornish is to be a knight?”

  “I don’t follow you at all.”

  “Well—look here. The Cornish Trust—Gerry is Managing Director, I’m Chairman of the Board (and I’ll keep the real power in my own hands, you may be sure), and Sir Francis Cornish is President, and the grand show-piece of the business. And Cornish is a bigoted Prot, as I have good cause to know.”

  “Will he do it?”

  “Indeed he will. He’s always been pestering me for a place in the business, and now there’s a place just right for him.”

  “Can he manage it?”

  “He’s very far from being a fool. He’s got a splendid war record, and that counts for a lot. And he doesn’t want to come back to Blairlogie. As president he’ll have no power I don’t choose to give him, and Gerry’ll watch him like a hawk. It’s tailor-made, Joe.”

  “Hamish, I’ve always said you were a downy one, but this beats everything.”

  “It’s not bad. Not bad at all. Everything has suddenly clicked into place.”

  “All things work together for good for those that love the Lord.”

  “Don’t be cynical, Joe. But if you mean that, you’re right. Even the third generation is taken care of. Gerry’s boys are good lads, and they’ll grow up to banking and trust business.”

  “And what about young Francis? Will Cornish let you cut his son out of this big game?”

  “Francis is a fine boy. I like him best of the lot, and I won’t see him pushed aside. But he’s not just what I look for in a boy who’s to grow up to be a banker. However, that’s not too great a problem; Mary-Jim writes to her mother that there’s another young Cornish on the way. If it’s a boy—and as you always tell your patients, it’s fifty-fifty that it will be—he can grow up to the family trade, which will be money, and a very good trade it is.”

  “I just hope he’s all right.”

  “What do you mean, Joe?”

  “Are you forgetting the lad upstairs?”

  “He wasn’t Cornish’s son. Cornish is sound. The father of that poor creature must have been a degenerate.”

  “But he is Mary-Jim’s son as well.”

  “I don’t follow you.”

  “Now Hamish, you know I hate to say unpleasant things—”

  “I know only too well that you love to say unpleasant things, Joe.”

  “That’s a nasty dig at an old friend, Hamish. But you must remember I’m a man of science, and science has to come to terms with facts, however unpleasant they may be. It takes two to make a child, and if there’s something wrong with the child, which of the two is responsible? You told me the father of that poor idjit upstairs was an unknown man, a soldier—”

  “God knows what he may have been. Rotten with disease, probably.”

  “No, not probably at all, for Mary-Jim has never shown any hint of what you’d expect from any such association, so you can’t blame it all on the man.”

  “Are you blaming it on my daughter?”

  “Easy, now, Hamish! Easy, man. Just give me another dram of that fine whisky, and I’ll explain. Because I’ve thought a lot about this matter, I can tell you, and I’ve read every book I can get hold of that might throw light on it. I lent you that book by Krafft-Ebing hoping you’d get a clue, but it seems you haven’t.”

  “That book was full of dirty rubbish.”

  “Life’s full of dirty rubbish. I’m a doctor and I know. If you’d read that book in a scientific spirit you’d have understood what it says. Krafft-Ebing’s the great name in this field still, you know, though he died a while back. But I’ve been reading Kraepelin, his successor, who’s the foremost man in this sort of medicine now, and there are certain points on which he and Krafft-Ebing are in full agreement. Now, if you’d read that book instead of skipping over to the earwax stories, you’d have taken in a very pertinent fact to what we’re discussing: a healthy, well-brought-up young woman has no sexual desire whatever. Oh, some romantic notions out of books, maybe, but not the real thing. She’s no notion of it, even if she has a rough idea how babies come. Now, look here: A very closely guarded, well-educated Catholic girl finds herself in a hotel room with a strange man. A servant, trained to keep his mind on his job, never to betray anything you might call humanity. Does he rape her? Not so far as we’ve been told. She said to you that one thing led to another. What thing was that one thing, Hamish?”

  “That’s enough, Joe. You’d better be on your way.”

  “No, it’s not enough, Hamish. You’ve got your head in the sand, man. And don’t order me to go, because I’m speaking to you as your family’s medical adviser—have been since I don’t know when—and this is nasty medicine I’m giving you, to make you well. I’m not saying Mary-Jim is a light woman. May this whisky be my poison if I ever thought any such thing! But even the purest woman may be victim of a disease of the mind—”

  “Joe—you don’t mean Mary-Jim’s touched?”

  “It’s not a permanent thing, Hamish, so far as I know. But it exists, and it attacks the young. In the profession we call it the furor uterinus.”

  “You know I have no Latin. What’s that mean?”

  “Well—I’d translate it as the rage o’ the womb. Uncontrollable desire.
I’ve seen it in some cases of women—low women down at the end o’ the town—and God forbid you should ever meet with such a thing. I mean, desire—well, sometimes a married woman, accustomed to that way of life—might feel something. On a hot night, for instance, in July. But many fine women never know any such trouble. So—what are we to make of it in poor Mary-Jim?”

  “God! You tell me a terrible thing!”

  “There are a lot of terrible things known to science, Hamish. And I don’t say that some terrible people don’t make capital of them. For instance this fellow Freud that we’re beginning to hear about now that we’re getting hold of medical books in German again. But nobody heeds him, and he’ll soon peter out—or be run out of the profession. But well-authenticated medical science, based on great experience—you can’t go against it.”

  “Joe, you hint at a world ridden and rotted with sex.”

  “I don’t hint. I know. Why do you suppose I’m a single man? Even though I know that Mary-Ben would have taken me years ago, and perhaps even now. It’s because I’ve seen too much, and I decided against it. Science has its celibates, as well as religion. And now the craze is for blathering about sex all over the place. Like that scoundrel Upper who was speaking in the public schools here, and telling innocent children God knows what! Did Francis say anything about him?”

  “I never heard him mention the name.”

  “Perhaps he escaped, then. He’s a frail lad. I don’t imagine anything like that has come into his head yet. When the time comes, I’d better have a talk with him. Put him on his guard.”

  “Perhaps so. But—Joe, do you suggest that this—this trouble you say Mary-Jim had—might affect the child that’s coming?”

  “I can say truthfully that I don’t know. But she has been leading the life of a married woman for many years now, and perhaps it’s burned itself out. That’s what we’ll hope.”

  “Another like that one upstairs would kill Marie-Louise. It might finish me. Joe—can nothing be done?”

  “Hamish, I told you once I wouldn’t kill, and that’s my answer now. Indeed, I’m sworn to keep that idjit alive; it’s my sacred profession. That’s why I had that wire affair made, to restrain his lust. Without it, he might rage and rip himself into the grave, but that’s not for me to encourage or condone. We must all of us just wait it out. But listen, Hamish: if family interests are moving to Toronto, why don’t you send Francis to school there? Mary-Tess and Gerry would keep an eye on him. I hear the Christian Brothers have a fine school in Toronto. Get him out of here. Get him away from these women. Just suppose by bad luck he happens on that thing upstairs. What a brother for him!”