Timothy's eyes left the fly, and levelled themselves on his visitor.
Soames could see his pale tongue passing over his darkish lips.
"Uncle Timothy," he said again, "is there anything I can do for you? Is
there anything you'd like to say?"
"Ha!" said Timothy.
"I've come to look you up and see that everything's all right."
Timothy nodded. He seemed trying to get used to the apparition before
him.
"Have you got everything you want?"
"No," said Timothy.
"Can I get you anything?"
"No," said Timothy.
"I'm Soames, you know; your nephew, Soames Forsyte. Your brother James'
son."
Timothy nodded.
"I shall be delighted to do anything I can for you."
Timothy beckoned. Soames went close to him:
"You--" said Timothy in a voice which seemed to have outlived tone, "you
tell them all from me--you tell them all--" and his finger tapped on
Soames' arm, "to hold on--hold on--Consols are goin' up," and he nodded
thrice.
"All right!" said Soames; "I will."
"Yes," said Timothy, and, fixing his eyes again on the ceiling, he
added: "That fly!"
Strangely moved, Soames looked at the Cook's pleasant fattish face, all
little puckers from staring at fires.
"That'll do him a world of good, sir," she said.
A mutter came from Timothy, but he was clearly speaking to himself, and
Soames went out with the cook.
"I wish I could make you a pink cream, Mr. Soames, like in old days; you
did so relish them. Good-bye, sir; it has been a pleasure."
"Take care of him, Cook, he is old."
And, shaking her crumpled hand, he went down-stairs. Smither was still
taking the air in the doorway.
"What do you think of him, Mr. Soames?"
"H'm!" Soames murmured: "He's lost touch."
"Yes," said Smither, "I was afraid you'd think that coming fresh out of
the world to see him like."
"Smither," said Soames, "we're all indebted to you."
"Oh, no, Mr. Soames, don't say that! It's a pleasure--he's such a
wonderful man."
"Well, good-bye!" said Soames, and got into his taxi.
'Going up!' he thought; 'going up!'
Reaching the hotel at Knightsbridge he went to their sitting-room,
and rang for tea. Neither of them were in. And again that sense of
loneliness came over him. These hotels. What monstrous great places they
were now! He could remember when there was nothing bigger than Long's or
Brown's, Morley's or the Tavistock, and the heads that were shaken over
the Langham and the Grand. Hotels and Clubs--Clubs and Hotels; no end to
them now! And Soames, who had just been watching at Lord's a miracle
of tradition and continuity, fell into reverie over the changes in
that London where he had been born five-and-sixty years before. Whether
Consols were going up or not, London had become a terrific property. No
such property in the world, unless it were New York! There was a lot of
hysteria in the papers nowadays; but any one who, like himself, could
remember London sixty years ago, and see it now, realised the fecundity
and elasticity of wealth. They had only to keep their heads, and go at
it steadily. Why! he remembered cobblestones, and stinking straw on the
floor of your cab. And old Timothy--what could he not have told them, if
he had kept his memory! Things were unsettled, people in a funk or in
a hurry, but here were London and the Thames, and out there the British
Empire, and the ends of the earth. "Consols are goin' up!" He should
n't be a bit surprised. It was the breed that counted. And all that was
bull-dogged in Soames stared for a moment out of his grey eyes, till
diverted by the print of a Victorian picture on the walls. The hotel
had bought three dozen of that little lot! The old hunting or "Rake's
Progress" prints in the old inns were worth looking at--but this
sentimental stuff--well, Victorianism had gone! "Tell them to hold on!"
old Timothy had said. But to what were they to hold on in this modern
welter of the "democratic principle"? Why, even privacy was threatened!
And at the thought that privacy might perish, Soames pushed back his
teacup and went to the window. Fancy owning no more of Nature than the
crowd out there owned of the flowers and trees and waters of Hyde Park!
No, no! Private possession underlay everything worth having. The world
had slipped its sanity a bit, as dogs now and again at full moon slipped
theirs and went off for a night's rabbiting; but the world, like the
dog, knew where its bread was buttered and its bed warm, and would come
back sure enough to the only home worth having--to private ownership.
The world was in its second childhood for the moment, like old
Timothy--eating its titbit first!