he said.
‘Don’t see that either,’ said Bob Ryrie.
‘That’s because you’ve never thought about it,’ Brand went on. ‘What did Christ say?’
Mrs Manson, sitting in the armchair by the fire, looked up. The tone in which Brand mentioned Christ disquieted her; he brought out the name as he might have brought out ‘Smith’ or ‘Mackay’.
‘What did Christ say? That you’re to love your neighbour as yourself. Is it loving your neighbour to pay him starvation wages, as lots of your churchgoing capitalists do? As I’ve told you before, it’s the churches that have got to be converted first.’
‘Yes, to Socialism,’ said Bob Ryrie, giving Mansie a wink.
‘And why not?’ Jean retorted. She did not even glance at Bob Ryrie, but kept her eyes fixed on Brand.
‘I thought myself that the churches were out for Christianity,’ said Bob, still to Mansie. ‘I may be mistaken, of course.’
Jean shrugged her shoulders.
‘And so they should be,’ Brand seized the lead again. ‘That’s just our quarrel with them. What have they done all these hundreds of years they’ve been in existence? Have they helped the weak? Have they abolished poverty? Look at the slums of Glasgow. You’ve never faced the problem yet. What did Christ say—’
‘In 1872,’ said Tom sarcastically, entering in his stocking soles and going to the fireplace to get his shoes.
‘Tom, Tom, my lamb, you mustna’ say things like that,’ said Mrs Manson, bending down to get his shoes for him or to hide her face.
Brand looked at Tom with blank uncomprehending eyes. ‘What did Christ say?’ he repeated. ‘That we’re all members of one another. That’s what any Socialist will tell you. That’s what we have been preaching for the last twenty years. And they won’t see it. And the Christians are the worst of the lot.’
‘Fine Christians you Socialists are!’ said Tom, pulling on his shoes. ‘I suppose you consider Ben Tillett a Christian?’
‘If he helps the weak he’s a Christian.’
‘“Oh God, strike Lord Devonport dead”!’ Tom intoned, jeeringly. ‘There’s Christianity for you. And he gets a crowd of ignorant navvies to repeat it after him in public.’
Bob Ryrie shook his head at Brand: ‘No, that wasn’t right, you know. A fellow can go a bit too far.’
Brand glanced at Jean; then he turned to Tom: ‘I’d like to ask you a question. Are you on Lord Devonport’s side or on Ben Tillett’s?’
‘I’m on the side of the poor devils that are starving on account of Devonport’s and Tillett’s damn foolishness.’
‘That’s all very well; but who’s fighting for better pay for them, and who’s fighting against it?’
‘I’m for better pay all the time, but—’
‘Wait a minute. What did Ben Tillett mean when he prayed to God to strike Devonport dead? Did he have any ill-will against Devonport? Not at all. He wanted to stop all these men and their families from starving. There’s thousands of women and children starving because of Lord Devonport. You never think of them; you only think of him.’
‘Oh, you can twist anything round,’ said Tom, bending his red face over the shoes. ‘When a Socialist does a damned measly action it’s bound to be right!’
‘I think it was a silly thing to do,’ said Jean. ‘Besides, if you think it was right, God evidently didn’t, for He didn’t answer their prayer.’
Tom laughed. ‘That’s logic for you, Brand,’ he said. ‘See if you can find an answer to that.’ He got up and walked out, and presently the front door slammed.
Brand seemed taken aback. Then he looked across at Mansie again: ‘Well, as I was saying—’
SIX
THOUGH JEAN WAS four years his junior, Mansie had a great respect for her opinion and felt singled out when it supported his; and so her dislike for Bob Ryrie, a dislike which nothing, it seemed, could alter, deeply disappointed him and even shook a little his own regard for his friend, although he would not admit it. After Bob’s first visit to the house – it was a few weeks before Helen broke with Tom – he asked Jean a little uncertainly what she thought of Ryrie. She put her nose in the air and said: ‘You feel he’s offering you a coupon.’ The blood rushed to Mansie’s cheeks; it was as though he himself had been attacked, and he replied: ‘Bob’s a gentleman! And he’s the kindest-hearted fellow you’ll meet.’
‘Well, he can keep his kindness to himself,’ said Jean, and it was clear that she did not consider Bob in the first class.
This was a very small class, but to her a definite one, and indeed the only one she was able to tolerate. She could not have told what qualities people had to possess to belong to it; yet she thought in classes, and so the very first thing that she might be expected to say when asked such a question as Mansie’s was, ‘He’s a pure third-rater,’ or ‘He’s tenth rate.’ But Bob was Mansie’s best friend, and so the exasperated figure of speech escaped her, and she felt irritated at Mansie for forcing her to speak ‘in conundrums’.
Oh, no doubt this Ryrie man was kind-hearted; he let you see that only too clearly; he let you see it in the way he shook hands, in his anxious hopes that you might like Glasgow – as if Glasgow belonged to him! – in his gentlemanly attentiveness, which made you feel that with his eyes he was supporting you in the mere act of living, helpfully assisting you to breathe and endure the immense strain of sitting upright in your chair. And Jean had sat up straighter, had braced her shoulders to hold off this smothering load of solicitude which was about to crush her. No, she could not stand the man, she could not stand his brown eyes with their protective glance, nor his brown moustache waxed at the points, which also seemed in some way an earnest of masculine protection, but became slightly limp, in spite of its waxy rigidity, when the protection was blankly ignored. She could not stand his brown tweed suit, which recapitulated again the note of enveloping protectiveness and gave out the delicatest aroma of tobacco and peat, a faint, pleasant and yet oppressive emanation of somnolence. She wanted to yawn, felt that she would like to go straight to sleep, and her voice when she replied to his polite enquiries sounded remote to her, like a monologue heard when one is half awake. And neither could she stand his neatly shaven face to which the bay rum still clung like a transparent film, making his cheeks look as though they had been iced; nor his scrubbed and manicured hands, nor his pipe for which he apologised, nor the way he inclined his head, like a servant awaiting orders. A fatuous ass, a pure tenth-rater, she told herself, and she was angry with Mansie for having such an acquaintance, and angry too that she could not say so more unequivocally.
But she was quite unequivocal enough for Mansie, and he felt both insulted in his taste and hurt on Bob’s account. For a fellow who made people feel that he was offering them coupons could hardly be considered first rate, and it was a galling reflection that his best friend was not first rate. Of course it was all a misunderstanding of Jean’s, all due to Bob’s kindness of heart; and besides she hadn’t seen him at his best; no, it was a pity, but Bob hadn’t been at his best. All the same the coupon stuck, and now Mansie could not help remembering that when he met Bob first he too had been a trifle nonplussed, maybe a little put off even.
