Chapter XI: The Split Infinitive

Guests at the Leightons' were divided into two classes. There were those who were friends of Mr. Leighton, and who therefore were interested in art, or literature, or science, or public enterprise, but were not expected to go further; and there were those who came in a general way and who might be expected to be interested in anything from a game of tennis to a tea party. Of the first might be reckoned the like of Mr. Sturgis, who painted pictures in a magnificent manner, and who, at the end of a large cigar, would breathe the heresies on the teaching of art which for ever paralyzed the artistic abilities of Elma. Mr. Sturgis was quite young enough for an Aunt Katharine public to quote his eligibility on all occasions.

"You don't understand, Aunt Katharine," Mabel told her once. "Nobody seems to understand that a man, even a young man, may adore papa without having to adore us at the same time. Mr. Sturgis is quite different from your kind of young man."

"Different from Robin, I suppose," sighed Aunt Katharine.

"Yes, quite different from Robin," said Mabel sedately. Robin had certainly from the first put Mr. Leighton into the position of being his daughter's father. Mr. Sturgis, on the other hand, found his first friend in Mr. Leighton because he had such a nice discriminating and most sympathetic enthusiasm for Art. Besides which Mr. Leighton had the attributes of an exceptional man in various respects.

The girls put Mr. Sturgis on the same high plane as their father and admired him openly accordingly. But there were others whom they put on this plane by reason of their accomplishments and yet did not admire at all.

Amongst these was the "Split Infinitive."

The first call on the part of Professor Theo. Clutterbuck was one never to be forgotten. He found a roomful of people who, so far as his own attitude to them was concerned, might have been so many pieces of furniture. Mr. Sturgis had at least the artist's discrimination which made him observe one's appearance, and he also allowed one to converse occasionally; but Dr. Clutterbuck rushed his one subject at Mr. Leighton from the moment of his entrance, and after that no one else existed.

"What more or less could you expect from the father of the Serpent?" asked Betty.

Lance was responsible for the nickname.

The Serpent, the elf-like daughter of the Professor, staying next to the Turbervilles, had introduced herself in a violent manner long ago to Betty and Elma. Sitting one day, hidden high in the maple tree, she cajoled her cat silently over the Turberville wall and from a wide branch sent him sprawling on a tea table. From the moment that the black cat drew a white paw from the cream jug, and a withering giggle from the maple tree disclosed the wicked little visage of the Serpent, war had been declared between the Clutterbucks and the Turbervilles. Lance occasionally removed the barrier and met the Professor in company with his own father.

"An awful crew," his verdict ran. "The Past Participle (Mrs. Clutterbuck) can't open her poor little timid mouth but the Split Infinitive is roaring at her. Consequently she keeps as silent as the grave."

"Will you kindly explain?" said Mrs. Leighton patiently. "It's a long time since I studied grammar in that intimate way. What is the Split Infinitive and why the Past Participle?"

"It's like this, Mrs. Leighton, simple when you know--or when you are married to a brute like Clutterbuck," said Lance mischievously. "I beg your pardon. I know I ought to say that he is a genius and all that sort of thing. But 'brute' seems more explicit."

"Go on with your story," said Mrs. Leighton.

"Well--Clutterbuck married Mrs. Clutterbuck."

"That's generally the end of a story, isn't it?" asked Jean.

Lance was not to be interrupted.

"Trust a boy for gossip," exclaimed Betty. "Fire away, Lance."

"My aunt knew them," said Lance. "She, Mrs. C., was a little dear, awfully pink and pretty you know, and Clutterbuck, a big raw thin thing with wild sort of hair and dreamy manners. Well, they were awfully proud and pleased with themselves, and started off for their honeymoon like two happy babies."

"Will you kindly tell me how you knew this?" asked Mrs. Leighton helplessly.

"I heard my aunt telling my mother," said Lance.

"There's a gleam in your eye which I don't quite trust," Elma remarked sedately. "Go on."

"Everything went well," exclaimed Lance, "until one morning when Mrs. C., all rosy and chiffony you know, said 'My dear Theo, I don't remember to ever have been so happy.' Clutterbuck rose from the table, as pale as death. She cried, 'Theo, Theo, tell me, what is wrong?' 'Wrong,' cried Professor Clutterbuck, 'you have used the Split Infinitive!' Gospel, Mrs. Leighton," said Lance as a wind-up. "She's been the Past Participle ever since."

There was this amount of truth in Lance's story: that Dr. Clutterbuck was distinguished in his own career as Professor of Geology, that his English was irreproachable; and that Mrs. Clutterbuck had practically no English, since she was hardly ever known to speak at all. She shunned society; and the same introspective gaze of the Professor, which had skimmed the Leighton drawing-room and found there only the striking personality of Mr. Leighton, skimmed his own home in a like abstracted manner, and took no notice of the most striking personality in Ridgetown--Elsie, his daughter.

It was the black cat episode which precipitated the nickname of "The Serpent." Lance had always declared that this girl had an understanding with animals which was nothing short of uncanny. He happened to read _Elsie Venner_, and the names being alike, and temperament on similar lines, he immediately christened her the Serpent. He caught her out at numberless pranks which were never reported to the diligent ears of Betty and May. One was that she had climbed to his bedroom and purloined a suit of clothes.

There was no end to what might be expected of this lonely little person.

Years ago, Betty and May had turned their backs on her in the cruel haphazard manner of two friends who might easily dispose of an outsider. Betty and May despised the Serpent because she "had a cheap governess," "couldn't afford to go to school," and "wore her hair in one plait."

The lonely little Serpent never properly forgave these insults.

Mrs. Leighton did not wholly encourage Lance in his tale.

"I do not think I approve of your being so down on these people," she said: "and if there is any truth in what you say, it is very tragic about poor Mrs. Clutterbuck, though she does not strike me as being a very capable person."

"Capable," asked Lance. "Who could remain capable, Mrs. Leighton, with a cold tap continually running freezing remarks down one's back. Don't you think it's a miracle she's alive?"

Mrs. Leighton preferred to remain on her smooth course of counsel.

"It never does to judge people like that," she exclaimed. "You do not know. To put it in a selfish manner, one day you may find the Clutterbucks being of more service to you than any one on earth."

She pulled at her knitting ball.

"You girls talk a great deal of romance and nonsense about people like the Dudgeons. Why don't you think something nice about that poor little Serpent for a change?"

The girls remembered not very long afterwards the prophetic nature of these remarks. That they should cultivate the Clutterbucks for any reason at all, however, seemed at that moment impossible.

Dr. Merryweather called the same afternoon.

It was one of the coincidences of life that he should immediately talk of the Clutterbucks.

"Know them?" he asked. "I think your husband does, doesn't he? Do you call on the wife at all?"

"No," answered Mrs. Leighton. "I never feel that I could get on with her very well either. Mr. Leighton meets the Professor and they talk a lot together, but it's quite away from domestic matters."

"It would be a bit of a kindness, I think," said the old Doctor, "your calling, I mean. There's too little public spirit amongst women, don't you think?"

"Oh, wouldn't it be a little impertinent perhaps to call, in that spirit?" asked Mrs. Leighton.

"Well, I don't know. The child is running wild. The parents are a pair of babies where healthy education is concerned. Result, the child has no friends, and expends her affection, she has stores of it, on her animals. A dog gets run over and dies. What do you get then? She never squeaks. Not a moan, you observe. But she sits up in that tree of hers with a cat to do any comforting she may want--and her hair begins to come out in patches."

Mrs. Leighton's knitting fell to her lap.

"Her hair is coming out in patches?" she asked in a horrified voice.

"Yes. What else would you have when a child is allowed to mope. Something is bound to happen. Clergymen are of use when a child's naughty. But when it mopes itself ill, we are called in. Yet it's a clergyman's task after all. This child, on the way to being a woman, has never had one friend. Her mother is too timid to be really friendly with any one, and the husband is wrapped in his dry-as-dust philosophy--and where are you with a tender child like that?"

"But if Mrs. Clutterbuck can't be friendly with any one, why should I call?" asked Mrs. Leighton hopelessly.

"Your girls might become friendly with the child," said he. "I'm afraid I don't make a very good clergyman."

"They call her the Serpent, you know," said Mrs. Leighton, "very naughty of them. I shall do my best, Doctor. I didn't know her hair was coming out in patches."

Dr. Merryweather might be complimented on his new profession after all. It had been a master stroke to refer to the patches. Mrs. Leighton had known of its happening after illness or great worry. That a child should suffer in this quiet moping manner seemed pathetic.

"Yet, I don't think I'm the person to do a thing of this sort," Mrs. Leighton said hopelessly to Miss Meredith later in the day. "I do so object to intrude on people. I should imagine it indelicate of any one else to do the same to myself, you know."

"Very awkward, certainly," replied Miss Meredith primly.

"Oh, mummy," said Elma, "you know how kind Miss Grace is or Miss Annie. They say 'Isn't Betty a little pale at present?' and you get her a tonic. You think nothing of that. It's just the same with the Clutterbucks. Betty ought to behave herself and go and call with you, and get the Serpent to come. I think she looks a jolly little thing."

Elma was quite alone in that opinion.

"Jolly!" said Jean, "you might as well talk of a toadstool's being jolly. Still, Betty isn't a child. She shouldn't be squabbling. Betty ought to call."

"You know Dr. Clutterbuck, wouldn't you call on his wife?" asked Mrs. Leighton of Miss Meredith.

"Oh, I'm afraid I don't know him well enough. Robin rather dislikes him--and, well, we have no young people, you see."

Miss Meredith was lame but definite.

"Then the sooner the better. Betty and I call to-morrow," said Mrs. Leighton.

They did, and to their astonishment found Mrs. Clutterbuck dimly but surely pleased. Nobody remained timid very long in Mrs. Leighton's kind presence, and the mutual subject of days long ago when it was no crime to talk of babies, broke the ice of years of reserve in Ridgetown with Mrs. Clutterbuck. The Serpent, after many pilgrimages on the part of the one maid to the garden, finally appeared. Mrs. Clutterbuck's restraint returned with the evident unwillingness of Elsie's attitude. Both retreated to the dumb condition so trying to onlookers.

The Serpent indeed paid Betty out for many months of torture. Her calm, disconcerting gaze never wavered, as she watched every movement of that ready enemy. Mrs. Leighton made her only mistake in showing definitely that she wanted to be kind to Elsie. That little lady's pale visage looked fiercely out at her and chilled the words that were intended to come.

It was as Betty described it a most "terrifying interview."

In the midst of it came a telegram to Mrs. Clutterbuck.

"Oh, you will excuse me," said she nervously. "We are expecting a friend."

During the interval of opening the envelope Elsie disappeared. It had the effect of warming Mrs. Clutterbuck to confidences once more.

"It is a great pleasure to me," said she. "My young cousin is coming. He is quite a distinguished, man. All Dr. Clutterbuck's people are distinguished, but my family are different. Except Arthur, whom Dr. Clutterbuck is quite pleased to meet. He is coming to-night."

She called the maid.

"Tell Miss Elsie it is the 5.40 train. Mr. Symington comes then."

She had a halting, staccato way of picking her small sentences, as though insecure of their effect.

"People enjoy coming to Ridgetown," said Mrs. Leighton lamely, in the endeavour to keep the wheels of conversation oiled more securely.

"Do they," asked the Professor's wife. Then she stammered a trifle. "A--a--that is--I have never had a visitor in Ridgetown till now. Dr. Clutterbuck does not care for visitors. Arthur is different from what others have been, I hope."

She seemed full of anxiety.

"Oh, I gave up long ago trying to please Mr. Leighton with my visitors," said Mrs. Leighton heartily and quite untruthfully. "Husbands must take their chance of that, you know." She rose to go.

"Please tell Dr. Clutterbuck he is never again to come to see us without you," she said, "and won't Elsie come to tea one day?"

On their departure Mrs. Clutterbuck turned to find a blazing little fury in the doorway.

"Mother," cried Elsie, "Mother! How could you! I shall never go to tea with Betty Leighton."

Her mother turned two eyes full of light on her. The light slowly died to dull patience again.

"We shall go down together to meet cousin Arthur," she said quietly. It seemed as though her bright thoughts must turn to drab colour automatically where either her husband or child was concerned.

It was characteristic of Elsie that, although blazing with wild anger and wicked little intentions, she should be unable to give voice to them at that moment. The inevitable obstinacy of her mother where the routine of the house was concerned, the drab colour of the one day which was invariably like the other, the cruel, cruel sameness of it all! It was impossible that Cousin Arthur should not be drab colour also.

"I'd rather remain here," she said at last. There was even some pleading in her tone.

"Your father said we had better meet Cousin Arthur," said her mother.

That was the remorseless end and beginning to everything. "Your father said" meant days and weeks and years of drab colour.

"Oh, let us go then," said Elsie. There was a drowning hopelessness in her voice, so great an emptiness that it was hard to believe she had merely used the words--"Let us go then."

Her mother accepted the answer without the sigh which burned in her heart because it had no outlet.

They proceeded to get ready to go out.

Mrs. Leighton and Betty by this time were chatting easily enough at the Merediths'. Mrs. Leighton had the feeling of an inexperienced general after a very indefinite victory.

"I do not possess the talent of inflicting myself gracefully on people," she said, "and the child is quite extraordinary. However, I liked the mother; she is a dear little woman."

Miss Meredith was only partially interested.

She arranged to walk home with them, and they set out in rather a slow manner.

"I can quite believe the child would be different in other surroundings," said Mrs. Leighton. "What a fine-looking man!" The one remark ran into the other automatically. In later days it seemed prophetic that the two people should be mentioned in one breath.

Mrs. Leighton was passing the station where arrivals from the train occurred. A cab was drawn up, and into this a sunburned, athletic-looking young man put some traps. Then he handed in Mrs. Clutterbuck and Elsie.

Betty was greatly impressed.

"It must be Mr. Symington," said she.

"Well, for a timid lady, she has a very man-like cousin," exclaimed Mrs. Leighton. "I don't wonder she was allowed that one visitor at least."

Miss Meredith turned her head carefully to a more slanting angle, when she clearly saw the carriage drive past.

"Do you know, Mrs. Leighton," she said quite nimbly and happily, "it seems very hard that she should not have all the visitors she wants. Dr. Merryweather is quite right. None of us have any public spirit. I think I shall call on her to-morrow."

So Miss Meredith also called on Mrs. Clutterbuck.