The Empire Trilogy - J. G. Farrell [149]
* * *
By this time the Major was perfectly numb to the daily horrors printed by the newspaper. He had become used to them as he had once become used to the dawn barrage. He supposed that one day it would all come to an end, somehow or other, because the situation was by no means static. On the contrary, it continued to get worse. “It has to get worse before it can get better,” remarked one of the ladies who was used to looking on the bright side. Early in January the sinister De Valera was reported to have returned to Ireland from America, having travelled, according to rumour, in, variously, a German submarine, a seaplane and a luxury yacht. Shortly afterwards there had been talk of peace negotiations between him and Lloyd George—but the days had gone by, multiplying into weeks. Nothing more had been heard. Instead, the Major congratulated himself on having resisted the impulse to visit the theatre in Dublin; a man sitting in the stalls of the Empire was shot in the chest while watching the pantomime The House that Jack Built. The advertisement for the show in the Irish Times carried the slogan: “Not a dull moment from rise to fall of curtain.” Meanwhile the English cricket team continued to lose test matches in Australia by huge margins.
In mid-February a young widow appeared at the Majestic. Her name was Frances Roche. Though not exactly beautiful, she was a pleasant young lady, without airs or graces, the sort of person one felt inclined to trust instinctively. Her husband had died early in the war leaving her comfortably off, a fact which lent her considerable prestige at the Majestic. But she took no advantage of it. She was just as kind to impoverished Miss Bagley as she was to wealthy Miss Staveley. True, she aroused some criticism because in certain respects she was inclined to be “modern” and lacking in finesse. But for the most part she was well received.
Mrs Roche had arrived accompanied by her mother, Mrs Bates, who in every respect was an older, more portly version of herself, though much less modern. Her mother was not in the least talkative, however. She listened and smiled but was hardly ever heard to utter a syllable. There was always a greater shortage of listeners than of talkers at the Majestic, and the new Mrs Bates (as opposed to the old Mrs Bates who had fallen off the stool before Christmas and long since gone to her reward) was as popular as her daughter. But it was, of course, in the daughter that Edward one day began to show an interest.
It was some time before the Major perceived what Edward had in mind, partly because he found it impossible to believe that any man in his right mind could prefer Mrs Roche, charming though she was, to Sarah—but then he remembered the jeering remark he had overheard and concluded that Edward was treating it as a challenge—and partly because Edward’s method of courtship was a curious one, consisting of advances so discreet as to be virtually invisible to anyone but himself. For example, he treated Mrs Roche herself with decorous formality and instead engaged her mother in long conversations which soon became—since Mrs Bates only allowed herself an occasional smile or nod of agreement—a rather frantic series of questions and answers, both supplied by Edward himself. “Ah, I see you’re interested in that painting over there,” he would say if Mrs Bates’s gaze wandered away from his face. “It shows King William crossing the Boyne after the famous battle...All the smoke in the background and so forth...” And then, shaking his head: “You’re wondering just what it was all about, I expect, apart from the religious aspect. Well, I’m afraid you have me there. We must ask Boy O’Neill. He’s sure to know all about it.” “Do we always have such a hard winter in Kilnalough? Now let me see: if I recollect rightly, last year and the year before that...” And so on.
For some time past Edward’s appearance