To young Anne Forsyte all was “just too lovely.” Never in her short life, confined to a large country, had she come across such defiant cosiness—the lush peace of the river, the songs of birds, the scents of flowers, the rustic arbour, the drifting lazy sky, now blue, now white, the friendly fat spaniel, and the feeling that tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow would for ever be the same as yesterday.

“It’s a poem, Jon.”

“Slightly comic. When everything’s slightly comic, you don’t tire.”

“I’d certainly never tire of this.”

“We don’t grow tragedy in England, Anne.”

“Why?”

“Well, tragedy’s extreme; and we don’t like extremes. Tragedy’s dry and England’s damp.”

She was leaning her elbows on the wall at the bottom of the garden, and, turning her chin a little in her hand, she looked round and up at him.

“Fleur Mont’s father lives on the river, doesn’t he? Is that far from here?”

“Mapledurham? I should think about ten miles.”

“I wonder if we shall see her at Ascot. I think she’s lovely.”

“Yes,” said Jon.

“I wonder you didn’t fall in love with her, Jon.”

“We were kids when I knew her.”

“I think she fell in love with you.”

“Why?”

“By the way she looks at you… She isn’t in love with Mr. Mont; she just likes him.”

“Oh!” said Jon.

Since in the coppice at Robin Hill Fleur had said “Jon!” in so strange a voice, he had known queer moments. There was that in him which could have caught her, balanced there on the log with her hands on his shoulders, and gone straight back into the past with her. There was that in him which abhorred the notion. There was that in him which sat apart and made a song about them both, and that in him which said: Get to work and drop all these silly feelings! He was, in fact, confused. The past, it seemed, did not die, as he had thought, but lived on beside the present, and sometimes, perhaps, became the future. Did one live for what one had not got? There was a wrinkling in his soul, and feverish draughts crept about within him. The whole thing was on his conscience—for if Jon had anything, he had a conscience.

“When we get our place,” he said, “we’ll have all these old-fashioned flowers. They’re much the sweetest!”

“Ah! Yes, do let’s get a home, Jon. Only are you sure you want one? Wouldn’t you like to travel and write poetry?”

“It’s not a job. Besides, my verse isn’t good enough. You want the mood of Hatteras J. Hopkins:

“I wish you weren’t modest, Jon.”

“It’s not modesty, Anne; it’s a sense of the comic.”

“Couldn’t we get a swim before dinner? It would be fine.”

“I don’t know what the regulations are here.”

“Let’s bathe first and find out afterwards.”

“All right. You go and change. I’ll get this gate open.”

A fish splashed, a long white cloud brushed the poplar tops beyond the water. Just such an evening, six years ago, he had walked the towing-path with Fleur, had separated from her, waited to see her look back and wave her hand. He could see her still—that special grace, which gave her movements a lingering solidity within the memory. And now—it was Anne! And Anne in water was a dream!…

Above the ‘Pouter Pigeon’ the sky was darkening; cars in their garages were still; no boats passed, only the water moved, and the river wind talked vaguely in the rushes and among the leaves. All within was cosy. On their backs lay Warmson and his Fifine, singing a little through their noses. By a bedside light Holly read ‘The Worst Journey in the World,’ and beside her Val dreamed that he was trying to stroke a horse’s nose, shortening under his hand to the size of a leopard’s. And Anne slept with her eyes hidden against Jon’s shoulder, and Jon lay staring at the crannies through which the moonlight eddied.

And in his stable at Ascot the son of Sleeping Dove, from home for the first time, pondered on the mutability of equine affairs, closing and opening his eyes, and breathing without sound in the strawy dark, above the black cat he had brought to bear him company.

To Winifred Dartie the debut of her son’s Sleeping Dove colt on Ascot Cup Day seemed an occasion for the gathering of such members of her family as were permitted to go racing by the primary caution in their blood; but it was almost a shock to her when Fleur telephoned: “Father’s coming; he’s never been to Ascot, and doesn’t know that he wants to go.”

“Oh!” she said, “then you’ll have to have two of my Enclosure tickets. Jack can fend for himself. But what about Michael?”

“Michael can’t come; he’s deep in slums—got a new slogan: ‘Broader gutters!’”

“He’s so good,” said Winifred. “Let’s go down early enough to lunch before racing, dear. I think we’d better drive.”

“Father’s car is up—we’ll call for you.”

“Delightful!” said Winifred. “Has your father got a grey top hat? No? Oh! But he simply must wear one; they’re all the go this year. Don’t say anything, just get him one. He wears seven-and-three-quarters; and dear, tell them to heat the hat and squash it in at the sides—otherwise they’re always too round for him. And he needn’t bring any money to speak of; Jack will do all our betting for us.”

Fleur thought that it was not likely father would have a bet; he had said he just wanted to see what the thing was like.

“He’s so funny about betting,” said Winifred, “like your grandfather.”

Not that it had been altogether funny in the case of James, who had been called on to pay the racing debts of Montague Dartie three times over.

With Soames and Winifred on the back seats, Fleur and Imogen on the front seats, and Jack Cardigan alongside Riggs, they took a circuitous road by way of Harrow to avoid the traffic, and emerged into it just at the point where for the first time it became thick. Soames, who had placed his grey top hat on his knee, put it on, and said:

“Just like Riggs!”

“Oh, no, Uncle!” said Imogen. “It’s Jack’s doing. When he’s got to go through Eton, he always like to go through Harrow first.”

“Oh! Ah!” said Soames. “He was there. I should like Kit’s name put down.”

“How nice!” said Imogen: “Our boys would still be there when he goes. You look so well in that hat, Uncle.”

Soames took it off again.

“White elephant,” he said. “Can’t think what made Fleur get me the thing!”

“My dear,” said Winifred, “it’ll last you for years. Jack’s had his ever since the war. The great thing is to prevent the moth getting into it, between seasons. What a lot of cars! I do think it’s wonderful that so many people should have the money in these days.”

The sight of so much money flowing down from town would have been more exhilarating to Soames if he had not been wondering where on earth they all got it. With the coal trade at a standstill, and factories closing down all over the place, this display of wealth and fashion, however reassuring, seemed to him almost indecent.

Jack Cardigan, from his front seat, had begun explaining a thing he called the ‘tote.’ It seemed to be a machine that did your betting for you. Jack Cardigan was a funny fellow; he made a life’s business of sport; there wasn’t another country that could have produced him! And, leaning forward, Soames said to Fleur: “You’ve not got a draught there?” She had been very silent all the way, and he knew why. Ten to one if young Jon Forsyte wouldn’t be at Ascot! Twice over at Mapledurham he had noticed letters addressed by her to:

“Mrs. Val Dartie, Wansdon, Sussex.”

She had seemed to him very fidgety or very listless all that fortnight. Once, when he had been talking to her about Kit’s future, she had said: “I don’t think it matters, Dad, whatever one proposes—he’ll dispose; parents don’t count now: look at me!”