Once or twice they had to put him away in a place in the country where the booze was sweated out of him and the pink mice which nibbled at his fingers and toes were shoo’ed away – that was what he said, anyway – but it seemed that they kept coming back, and he was off getting another ‘cure’.
‘A fine thing,’ sniffed old Morrison – we were at dinner on my first evening home, and I had hoped to have it in bed with Elspeth, but of course we had to do ‘the polite’ by her parents – ‘a fine thing, indeed. He’ll drink himsel’ intae the grave, I suppose.’
‘Probably,’ says I. ‘His father and grand-father did, so I don’t see why he shouldn’t.’
Mrs Morrison, who in defiance of probability had grown with the years even more like a vulture, gave a gasp of disgust at this, and old Morrison said he didn’t doubt that the son of the house would follow in his ancestors’ besotted footsteps.
‘Shouldn’t wonder,’ says I, helping myself to claret. ‘I’ve got a better excuse than they had.’
‘And whit does that mean, sir?’ bridled old Morrison. I didn’t bother to tell him, so he started off on a great rant about ingratitude and perversity, and the dissolute habits of myself and my family, and finished up with his age-old lamentation about his daughter having married a wastrel and a ruffian, who hadn’t even the decency to stay at home with his wife like a Christian, but must be forever wandering like Ishmael …
‘Hold on,’ says I, for I was sick of this. ‘Since I married your daughter I have been twice abroad, on my country’s service, and on the first occasion at least I came home with a good deal of credit. I’ll wager you weren’t slow to boast about your distinguished son-in-law when I came back from India in ’42.’
‘And what have ye made of it?’ sneers he. ‘What are ye? A captain still, and like to remain one.’
‘You’re never tired of reminding Elspeth in your letters that you keep this family, this house, and the rest of it. Buy me a majority, if military rank means so much to you.’
‘Damn yer impudence!’ says he. ‘Is it no’ enough that I keep you and yer drunken father oot o’ the poor’s-hoose, where ye belong?’
‘I’d have thought so,’ says I, ‘but if you want me to shoot up the military tree as well – why, it costs money, you know.’
‘Aye, weel, deil’s the penny ye’ll get from me,’ snaps he. ‘Enough is bein’ spent on wanton folly as it is,’ and it seemed to me he darted a look at his vinegary spouse, who sniffed and coloured a bit. What’s this, I wondered: surely she hasn’t been asking him to buy her a pair of colours: Horse Guards wouldn’t have taken her, anyway, not for a commission: farrier-sergeant, perhaps, but no higher.
No more was said at dinner, which ended in a merry atmosphere of poisonous ill-will, but I got the explanation from Elspeth when we had retired for the night. It seemed that her mother had been growing increasingly concerned at her inability to get Elspeth’s two virgin sisters married off: the oldest girl, Mary, had been settled on some commercial creature in Glasgow, and was breeding at a rare rate, but Agnes and Grizel were still single. I said surely there were enough fortune-hunters in Scotland ready to take a shot at her father’s money, but she said no, her mother had discouraged them. She was flying higher, reasoning that if Elspeth had been able to get me, who had titled relatives and was at least half way into the great world of fashionable society, Agnes and Grizel could do even better.
‘She’s mad,’ says I. ‘If they had your looks it might be a half-chance, but one sight of your dear parents is going to scare any eligible sprig a mile off. Sorry, m’dear, but they ain’t acceptable, you know.’
‘My parents certainly lack the advantages,’ says Elspeth seriously. Marrying me had turned her into a most wonderful snob. ‘That I admit. But father is extremely rich, as you are aware—’
‘To hear him, it’s no fault of ours if he is.’
‘—and you know, Harry, that quite a few of our titled acquaintances are not too nice to look above a fine dowry. I think, with the right introductions, that Mama might find very suitable husbands for them. Agnes is plain, certainly, but little Grizel is really pretty, and their education has been quite as careful as my own.’
It isn’t easy for a beautiful woman with blue eyes, a milky complexion, and corn-gold hair to look pompous, especially when she is wearing only a French corset decorated with pink ribbons, but Elspeth managed it. At that moment I was overcome again with that yearning affection for her that I sometimes felt, in spite of her infidelities; I can’t explain it, beyond saying that she must have had some magic quality, something to do with the child-like, thoughtful look she wore, and the pure, helpless stupidity in her eyes. It is very difficult not to like a lovely idiot.
‘Since you’re so well-educated,’ says I, pulling her down beside me, ‘let’s see how much you remember.’ And I put her through a most searching test which, being Elspeth, she interrupted from time to time with her serious observations on Mrs Morrison’s chances of marrying off the two chits.
‘Well,’ says I, when we were exhausted, ‘so long as I ain’t expected to help launch ’em in Society, I don’t mind. Good luck to it, I say, and I hope they get a Duke apiece.’
But of course, I had to be dragged into it: Elspeth was quite determined to use my celebrity for what it was still worth, on her sisters’ behalf, and I knew that when she was insistent there was no way of resisting her. She controlled the purse-strings, you see, and the cash I had brought home wouldn’t last long at my rate of spending, I knew. So it was a fairly bleak prospect I had come back to: the guv’nor away in the grip of the quacks and demon drink, old Morrison in the house carping and snuffling, Elspeth and Mrs Morrison planning their campaign to inflict her sisters on unsuspecting London, and myself likely to be roped in – which meant being exposed in public alongside my charming Scotch relations. I should have to take old Morrison to my club, and stand behind Mrs Morrison’s chair at parties – no doubt listening to her teaching some refined mama the recipe for haggis – and have people saying: ‘Seen Flashy’s in-laws? They eat peat, don’t you know, and speak nothing but Gaelic. Well, it wasn’t English, surely?’
Oh, I knew what to expect, and determined to keep out of it. I thought of going to see my Uncle Bindley at the Horse Guards, and beseeching him to arrange an appointment for me to some regiment out of town – I was off the active list just then, and was not relishing the idea of half-pay anyway. And while I was hesitating, in those first few days at home, the letter came that helped to solve my difficulties for me and incidentally changed the map of Europe.
It came like the answer to a pagan’s prayer, along with a dun from some tailor or other, an anti-popish tract, a demand for my club subscription, and an invitation to buy railway shares – all the usual trash. Why I should remember the others, I don’t know. I must have a perverse memory, for the contents of the big white envelope should have been enough to drive them out of my head.
It was a fine, imposing cover – best quality paper, with a coat-of-arms on the back, which I have before me now. There was a shield, quartered red, blue, blue, and white, and in the quarters were a sword, a crowned lion, what looked like a fat whale, and a pink rose. Plainly it was either from someone of tremendous rank or the manufacturers of a new brand of treacle.19
Inside there was a letter, and stamped at the top in flowery letters, surrounded by foliage full of pink-bottomed cupids, were the words, ‘Gräfin de Landsfeld’. And who the deuce, I wondered, might she be, and what did she want with me.
The letter I reproduce exactly as it now lies in my hand, very worn and creased after sixty years, but still perfectly legible. It is, I think, quite the most remarkable communication I have ever received – even including the letter of thanks I got from Jefferson Davis and the reprieve I was given in Mexico. It said:
Most Honoured Sir,
I write to you on instruction of Her Grace, the Countess de Landsfeld, of whom you had the honour