and, since she was a woman of considerable temperament, that implied the twenty-two lovers already stirring in the womb of futurity. And finally, since Isabel was as healthy as a young woman could be who had to wear madly tight corsets and long insanitary hair and long insanitary skirts, and who had rudimentary ideas of sex hygiene – finally, that nuit de rove gave Isabel her first baby.
2
THE baby was christened Edward Frederick George – Edward after the Prince of Wales (later H. M. King Edward VII.), Frederick after his grandfather, George after his father.
Isabel wanted to call him George Hartly, but dear Mamma saw to it that there was as little Hartly as possible about her grandson.
The early years of the Isabel-George Augustus menage are really very dismal to contemplate. Largely because it was forced upon them by their elders and social convention, they began on a basis of humbug; unfortunately, they continued on a basis of humbug. Not only were they shattered by the awful experience of the wedding-night, but they were a good deal bored by the honeymoon generally. There wasn’t much to do at Isabel’s sweetly-pretty watering-place. George Augustus wouldn’t admit even to himself that he was about as competent to be a husband as to teach white mice to perform military-evolutions. Isabel knew in herself that they had begun with a ghastly failure, knew it with her instincts rather than her mind, but she had her pride. She knew perfectly well that the failure would be attributed to her, and that she could expect no sympathy from any one, least of all her own family. Wasn’t she “happily” married to a man who “luved” her – a “luv” match – and to a “rich” man? So Isabel consoled herself with the thought that George Augustus was “rich”, and they both wrote ecstatic humbugging honeymoon letters to families and friends. And once they had started on the opposite road to honesty and facing facts, they were dished for life – condemned, they too, to the dreary landscape of humbug and “luv”. O that God and Luv business! Isn’t it mysterious that Isabel didn’t take warning from the wretched cat-and-dog life of Ma and Pa, and that George Augustus hadn’t noticed the hatred which surged between dear Mamma and dear Papa under the viscid surface of domestic peace and religion; and that they didn’t try to break away to something a little better? But no, they accepted the standards, they had luv and they had God, so of course all would be for the best in this best of all possible worlds.
George Augustus continued to play at being “rich” on his honeymoon. A week before his wedding he was allowed a banking account for the first time in his life. Dear Papa paid in £200, and, by arrangement with George Augustus, dear Mamma was made to believe it was £20. To this dear Mamma added a generous £5 from her own jointure, “a little nest-egg for a rainy day” – though what on earth you want with a “nest-egg” on “a rainy day”, God and Luv only know. So the happy young couple started out with £205, and not the slightest chance of earning a penny until George Augustus gave up being “rich” and “pretty comfortable” and settled down to face facts and do a little work.
They spent a good deal – for them – on the honeymoon. George Augustus had a purse containing a lot of sovereigns and two £5 notes, with which he swanked intolerably. Isabel had never seen so much money at once and thought George Augustus was richer than ever. So she immedi-ately began sending “useful presents” to the innumerable members of the impoverished Hartly family; and George Augustus, though annoyed – for he was fundamentally mean – let her. Altogether they spent £30 in a fortnight, and the first-class fares back to Sheffield left mighty little change out of another £5 note.
The first great shock of Isabel’s life was her wedding-night. The second was when she saw the dingy little, smoke-blacked house of the “rich” Winterbournes, one of a row of highly desirable yellow-brick ten-roomed villas. The third was when she found that George Augustus earned nothing by his Profession, that he had no money but the balance of his £205, and that the Winterbournes were nearly as poor as the Hartlys.
Ghastly days that poor girl spent in that dreary little house during her first pregnancy, while George Augustus twiddled his thumbs in “the Office” (instead of in his cosy study” as in his bachelor days) under pretence of working”; while dear Papa prayed, and dear Mamma acid-sweetly nagged and humiliated her. Ghastly days when her morning sickness was treated as “a bilious attack”.
“Too much rich food,” said dear Mamma; “of course, darling Isabel, you were not used to such a plentiful table at home,” – and then playful-coyly-cattish – “we must really ask your dear husband to use his authority to restrain your appetite.”
In fact, the Hartlys, in a scratchy, vulgarish way, enjoyed much more ample and varied food than that provided by dear Mamma’s cheeseparing, genteelly meagre table.
Then, of course, there were rows. Isabel revolted, and displayed signs of that indomitable personality and talent for violent invective she afterwards developed to such Everest peaks of unpleasantness. Even dear Mamma found her match, but not before she had made Isabel miserably wretched for nearly two years and had permanently warped her character. Blessings upon you, dear Mamma, you “prayed for guidance”, you “did all for the best” – and you made Isabel into a first-class bitch.
George Augustus was pained, deeply pained and surprised, by these rows. He was still pretty comfortable, and couldn’t see why Isabel wasn’t.
“Let us continue to be a loving, united family,” he would say, “let us bear with one another. We all have our burdens” – (e.g. thumb-twiddling and reading novels) – “and all we need is a little more Luv, a little more Forbearance. We must pray for Strength and Guidance.”
At first Isabel took these homilies pretty meekly. She believed she had to “respect” her husband, and she was still a little intimidated by George Augustus’s superior Bulwer Lytton airs. But one day she lost her not very well-controlled temper and let the Winterbournes have it. George Augustus was a sneak and a cad and a liar! He wasn’t “rich”! He was “pore as a church mouse”! Him and his airs, pretending to her father he was a rich gentleman with a Profession, when he didn’t earn a penny and got married on the £200 his father gave him! She wouldn’t have married him, she wouldn’t, if he hadn’t come smarming round with his presents and his drives and pretending she would be a lady! And she wished she was dead, she did! And she wished she’d never set eyes on them!
Then the fat was in the fire! Dear Mamma took up the tale. Reserving in petto a denunciation of the guilt-stricken and consternated father and son in the matter of their deception over the £200, she directed a skilful enfilade fire on the disarmed Isabel. Isabel was vulgar and irreligious, she was ill-bred and uneducated, she was mercenary on her own showing, and had ruined the hopeful life of George Augustus by seducing him into a disastrous marriage…
At that moment Isabel fainted, and most unfortunately for our George the threatened miscarriage was averted – thanks more to Isabel’s health and vitality than to the ministrations of her inept husband and in-laws. Only dear Papa was genuinely distressed, and used what shred of influence he had to protect Isabel. As for George Augustus, he simply collapsed, and did nothing but ejaculate:
“Dear Mamma! Isabel! Let us be loving and united. Let us bear one another’s burdens!”
But he was swept away in the torrent of genuine hatred revealed by this instructive scene. Even dear Mamma dropped her Nonconformist tract hypocrisy, and only picked it up again when Isabel fainted.
On dear Papa’s suggestion George Augustus took Isabel away to the seaside on what was left of the £200; and thus it happened that George was born in a seaside hotel.
It was a difficult birth, clumsily doctored. Isabel suffered tortures for nearly forty hours. If she had not been as strong as a young
