The announcement in The Times of his cousin Jolyon's death affected
Soames quite simply. So that chap was gone! There had never been a
time in their two lives when love had not been lost between them. That
quick-blooded sentiment hatred had run its course long since in Soames'
heart, and he had refused to allow any recrudescence, but he considered
this early decease a piece of poetic justice. For twenty years the
fellow had enjoyed the reversion of his wife and house, and--he
was dead! The obituary notice, which appeared a little later, paid
Jolyon--he thought--too much attention. It spoke of that "diligent and
agreeable painter whose work we have come to look on as typical of
the best late-Victorian water-colour art." Soames, who had almost
mechanically preferred Mole, Morpin, and Caswell Baye, and had always
sniffed quite audibly when he came to one of his cousin's on the line,
turned The Times with a crackle.
He had to go up to Town that morning on Forsyte affairs, and was fully
conscious of Gradman's glance sidelong over his spectacles. The old
clerk had about him an aura of regretful congratulation. He smelled, as
it were, of old days. One could almost hear him thinking: "Mr. Jolyon,
ye-es--just my age, and gone--dear, dear! I dare say she feels it. She
was a mice-lookin' woman. Flesh is flesh! They've given 'im a notice
in the papers. Fancy!" His atmosphere in fact caused Soames to handle
certain leases and conversions with exceptional swiftness.
"About that settlement on Miss Fleur, Mr. Soames?"
"I've thought better of that," answered Soames shortly.
"Ah! I'm glad of that. I thought you were a little hasty. The times do
change."
How this death would affect Fleur had begun to trouble Soames. He was
not certain that she knew of it--she seldom looked at the paper, never
at the births, marriages, and deaths.
He pressed matters on, and made his way to Green Street for lunch.
Winifred was almost doleful. Jack Cardigan had broken a splashboard,
so far as one could make out, and would not be "fit" for some time. She
could not get used to the idea.
"Did Profond ever get off?" he said suddenly.
"He got off," replied Winifred, "but where--I don't know."
Yes, there it was--impossible to tell anything! Not that he wanted to
know. Letters from Annette were coming from Dieppe, where she and her
mother were staying.
"You saw that fellow's death, I suppose?"
"Yes," said Winifred. "I'm sorry for--for his children. He was very
amiable." Soames uttered a rather queer sound. A suspicion of the old
deep truth--that men were judged in this world rather by what they were
than by what they did--crept and knocked resentfully at the back doors
of his mind.