Aaron's Rod, D. H. Lawrence [book recommendations for young adults .TXT] 📗

thing said! Ha-ha-ha.” Argyle laughed his Mephistophelian tipsy laugh. “They’ll teach you to save. Never was such a lot of ripe old savers! Save their old trouser-buttons! Go to them if you want to learn to save. Oh, yes, I advise it seriously. You’ll lose nothing— not even a reputation.—You may lose a SOUL, of course. But that’s a detail, among such a hoard of banknotes and trouser-buttons. Ha-ha! What’s a soul, to them—?”

“What is it to you, is perhaps the more pertinent question,” said Algy, flapping his eyelids like some crazy owl. “It is you who specialise in the matter of soul, and we who are in need of enlightenment—”

“Yes, very true, you ARE! You ARE in need of enlightenment. A set of benighted wise virgins. Ha-ha-ha! That’s good, that—benighted wise virgins! What—” Argyle put his red face near to Aaron’s, and made a moue, narrowing his eyes quizzically as he peered up from under his level grey eyebrows. “Sit in the dark to save the lamp-oil—And all no good to them.—When the bridegroom cometh—! Ha-ha! Good that! Good, my boy!—The bridegroom—” he giggled to himself. “What about the bridegroom, Algy, my boy? Eh? What about him? Better trim your wick, old man, if it’s not too late—”

“We were talking of souls, not wicks, Argyle,” said Algy.

“Same thing. Upon my soul it all amounts to the same thing. Where’s the soul in a man that hasn’t got a bedfellow—eh?—answer me that! Can’t be done you know. Might as well ask a virgin chicken to lay you an egg.”

“Then there ought to be a good deal of it about,” said Algy.

“Of what? Of soul? There ought to be a good deal of soul about?—Ah, because there’s a good deal of—, you mean.—Ah, I wish it were so. I wish it were so. But, believe me, there’s far more damned chastity in the world, than anything else. Even in this town.—Call it chastity, if you like. I see nothing in it but sterility. It takes a rat to praise long tails. Impotence set up the praise of chastity—believe me or not—but that’s the bottom of it. The virtue is made out of the necessity.—Ha-ha-ha!—Like them! Like them! Ha-ha! Saving their souls! Why they’d save the waste matter of their bodies if they could. Grieves them to part with it.—Ha! ha!—ha!”

There was a pause. Argyle was in his cups, which left no more to be said. Algy, quivering and angry, looked disconcertingly round the room as if he were quite calm and collected. The deaf Jewish Rosen was smiling down his nose and saying: “What was that last? I didn’t catch that last,” cupping his ear with his hand in the frantic hope that someone would answer. No one paid any heed.

“I shall be going,” said Algy, looking round. Then to Aaron he said, “You play the flute, I hear. May we hear you some time?”

“Yes,” said Aaron, non-committal.

“Well, look here—come to tea tomorrow. I shall have some friends, and Del Torre will play the piano. Come to tea tomorrow, will you?”

“Thank you, I will.”

“And perhaps you’ll bring your flute along.”

“Don’t you do any such thing, my boy. Make them entertain YOU, for once.—They’re always squeezing an entertainment out of somebody—” and Argyle desperately emptied the remains of Algy’s wine into his own glass: whilst Algy stood as if listening to something far off, and blinking terribly.

“Anyhow,” he said at length, “you’ll come, won’t you? And bring the flute if you feel like it.”

“Don’t you take that flute, my boy,” persisted Argyle. “Don’t think of such a thing. If they want a concert, let them buy their tickets and go to the Teatro Diana. Or to Marchesa del Torre’s Saturday morning. She can afford to treat them.” Algy looked at Argyle, and blinked. “Well,” he said. “I hope you’ll get home all right, Argyle.”

“Thank you for your courtesy, Algy. Won’t you lend me your arm?”

As Algy was small and frail, somewhat shaky, and as Argyle was a finely built, heavy man of fifty or more, the slap was unkind.

“Afraid I can’t tonight. Good-night—”

Algy departed, so did little Mee, who had sat with a little delighted disapproval on his tiny, bird-like face, without saying anything. And even the Jew Rosen put away his deaf-machine and began awkwardly to take his leave. His long nose was smiling to itself complacently at all the things Argyle had been saying.

When he, too, had gone, Argyle arched his brows at Aaron, saying:

“Oh, my dear fellow, what a lot they are!—Little Mee—looking like an innocent little boy. He’s over seventy if he’s a day. Well over seventy. Well, you don’t believe me. Ask his mother—ask his mother. She’s ninety-five. Old lady of ninety-five—” Argyle even laughed himself at his own preposterousness.

“And then Algy—Algy’s not a fool, you know. Oh, he can be most entertaining, most witty, and amusing. But he’s out of place here. He should be in Kensington, dandling round the ladies’ drawing rooms and making his mots. They’re rich, you know, the pair of them. Little Mee used to boast that he lived on eleven-and-three-pence a week. Had to, poor chap. But then what does a white mouse like that need? Makes a heavy meal on a cheese-paring. Luck, you know— but of course he’s come into money as well. Rich as Croesus, and still lives on nineteen-and-two-pence a week. Though it’s nearly double, of course, what it used to be. No wonder he looks anxious. They disapprove of me—oh, quite right, quite right from their own point of view. Where would their money be otherwise? It wouldn’t last long if I laid hands on it—” he made a devilish quizzing face. “But you know, they get on my nerves. Little old maids, you know, little old maids. I’m sure I’m surprised at their patience with me.— But when people are patient with you, you want to spit gall at them. Don’t you? Ha-ha-ha! Poor old Algy.—Did I lay it on him tonight, or did I miss him?”

“I think you got him,” said Aaron.

“He’ll never forgive me. Depend on it, he’ll never forgive me. Ha- ha! I like to be unforgiven. It adds ZEST to one’s intercourse with people, to know that they’ll never forgive one. Ha-ha-ha! Little old maids, who do their knitting with their tongues. Poor old Algy—he drops his stitches now. Ha-ha-ha!—Must be eighty, I should say.”

Aaron laughed. He had never met a man like Argyle before—and he could not help being charmed. The other man had a certain wicked whimsicality that was very attractive, when levelled against someone else, and not against oneself. He must have been very handsome in his day, with his natural dignity, and his clean-shaven strong square face. But now his face was all red and softened and inflamed, his eyes had gone small and wicked under his bushy grey brows. Still he had a presence. And his grey hair, almost gone white, was still handsome.

“And what are you going to do in Florence?” asked Argyle.

Aaron explained.

“Well,” said Argyle. “Make what you can out of them, and then go. Go before they have time to do the dirty on you. If they think you want anything from them, they’ll treat you like a dog, like a dog. Oh, they’re very frightened of anybody who wants anything of them: frightened to death. I see nothing of them.—Live by myself—see nobody. Can’t stand it, you know: their silly little teaparties— simply can’t stand it. No, I live alone—and shall die alone.—At least, I sincerely hope so. I should be sorry to have any of them hanging round.”

The restaurant was empty, the pale, malarial waiter—he had of course contracted malaria during the war—was looking purple round the eyes. But Argyle callously sat on. Aaron therefore rose to his feet.

“Oh, I’m coming, I’m coming,” said Argyle.

He got unsteadily to his feet. The waiter helped him on with his coat: and he put a disreputable-looking little curly hat on his head. Then he took his stick.

“Don’t look at my appearance, my dear fellow,” said Argyle. “I am frayed at the wrists—look here!” He showed the cuffs of his overcoat, just frayed through. “I’ve got a trunkful of clothes in London, if only somebody would bring it out to me.—Ready then! Avanti!”

And so they passed out into the still rainy street. Argyle lived in the very centre of the town: in the Cathedral Square. Aaron left him at his hotel door.

“But come and see me,” said Argyle. “Call for me at twelve o’clock— or just before twelve—and let us have luncheon together. What! Is that all right?—Yes, come just before twelve.—When?—Tomorrow? Tomorrow morning? Will you come tomorrow?”

Aaron said he would on Monday.

“Monday, eh! You say Monday! Very well then. Don’t you forget now. Don’t you forget. For I’ve a memory like a vice. I shan’t forget.— Just before twelve then. And come right up. I’m right under the roof. In Paradise, as the porter always says. Siamo nel paradiso. But he’s a cretin. As near Paradise as I care for, for it’s devilish hot in summer, and damned cold in winter. Don’t you forget now—Monday, twelve o’clock.”

And Argyle pinched Aaron’s arm fast, then went unsteadily up the steps to his hotel door.

The next day at Algy’s there was a crowd Algy had a very pleasant flat indeed, kept more scrupulously neat and finicking than ever any woman’s flat was kept. So today, with its bowls of flowers and its pictures and books and old furniture, and Algy, very nicely dressed, fluttering and blinking and making really a charming host, it was all very delightful to the little mob of visitors. They were a curious lot, it is true: everybody rather exceptional. Which though it may be startling, is so very much better fun than everybody all alike. Aaron talked to an old, old Italian elegant in side-curls, who peeled off his grey gloves and studied his formalities with a delightful Mid-Victorian dash, and told stories about a plaint which Lady Surry had against Lord Marsh, and was quite incomprehensible. Out rolled the English words, like plums out of a burst bag, and all completely unintelligible. But the old beau was supremely satisfied. He loved talking English, and holding his listeners spell-bound.

Next to Aaron on the sofa sat the Marchesa del Torre, an American woman from the Southern States, who had lived most of her life in Europe. She was about forty years of age, handsome, well-dressed, and quiet in the buzz of the tea-party. It was evident she was one of Algy’s lionesses. Now she sat by Aaron, eating nothing, but taking a cup of tea and keeping still. She seemed sad—or not well perhaps. Her eyes were heavy. But she was very carefully made up, and very well dressed, though simply: