I expect you’ve been going the pace a bit in Paris.
Well, you’re young and that’s to be expected.”
He suddenly felt a trifle embarrassed.
“Anyhow, that’s no business of mine, and I think there are things a father and son needn’t go into.
But accidents will happen in the best regulated families, and well, what I want to say is, if you find you’ve got anything the matter with you, don’t hesitate but go and see a doctor right away.
Old Sinnery brought you into the world and so you needn’t be shy of him.
He’s discretion itself and he’ll put you right in no time; the bill will be paid and no questions asked.
That’s all I wanted to tell you; now let’s go and join your poor mother.”
Charley had blushed scarlet when he understood what his father was talking about.
He felt he ought to say something, but could think of nothing to say.
When they came into the drawing-room Patsy was playing a waltz of Chopin’s and after she had finished his mother asked Charley to play something.
“I suppose you haven’t played since you left?”
“One afternoon I played a little on the hotel piano, but it was a very poor one.”
He sat down and played again that piece of Scriabin’s that Lydia thought he played so badly, and as he began he had a sudden recollection of that stuffy, smoky cellar to which she had taken him, of those roughs he had made such friends with, and of the Russian woman, gaunt and gipsy-skinned, with her enormous eyes, who had sung those wild, barbaric songs with such a tragic abandon.
Through the notes he struck he seemed to hear her raucous, harsh and yet deeply moving voice.
Leslie Mason had a sensitive ear.
“You play that thing differently from the way you used,” he said when Charley got up from the piano.
“I don’t think so.
Do I?”
“Yes, the feeling’s quite different.
You get a sort of tremor in it that’s rather effective.”
“I like the old way better, Charley.
You made it sound rather morbid,” said Mrs. Mason.
They sat down to bridge.
“This is like old times,” said Leslie.
“We’ve missed our family bridge since you’ve been away.”
Leslie Mason had a theory that the way a man played bridge was an indication of his character, and since he looked upon himself as a dashing, open-handed, free-and-easy fellow, he consistently overcalled his hand and recklessly doubled.
He looked upon a finesse as un-English.
Mrs. Mason on the other hand played strictly according to the rules of Culbertson and laboriously counted up the pips before she ventured on a call.
She never took a risk.
Patsy was the only member of the family who by some freak of nature had a card sense.
She was a bold, clever player and seemed to know by intuition how the cards were placed.
She made no secret of her disdain for the respective methods of play of her parents.
She was domineering at the card table.
The game proceeded in just the same way as on how many evenings it had done.
Leslie, after overcalling, was doubled by his daughter, redoubled, and with triumph went down fourteen hundred; Mrs. Mason, with her hand full of picture cards, refused to listen to her partner’s insistent demand for a slam; Charley was careless.
“Why didn’t you return me a diamond, you fool?” cried Patsy.
“Why should I return you a diamond?”
“Didn’t you see me play a nine and then a six?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Gosh, that I should be condemned to play all my life with people who don’t know the ace of spades from a cow’s tail.”
“It only made the difference of a trick.”
“A trick?
A trick?
A trick can make all the difference in the world.”
None of them paid any attention to Patsy’s indignation.
They only laughed and she, giving them up as a bad job, laughed with them.
Leslie carefully added up the scores and entered them in a book.
They only played for a penny a hundred, but they pretended to play for a pound, because it looked better and was more thrilling.
Sometimes Leslie would have marked up against him in the book sums like fifteen hundred pounds and would say with seeming seriousness that if things went on like that he’d have to put down the car and go to his office by bus.