The Greatest Works of E. M. Delafield (Illustrated Edition). E. M. Delafield
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an argument, my good ass? For the matter of that, there's the dear old nursery high chair that I used to sit in, but I suppose you don't want me to use it now because I did then?"
Zella laughed, entirely on the side of James, who always got the best of an argument.
Muriel's only retort was, "That is quite different," uttered in a sentimental voice verging on tearfulness.
"It's exactly the same principle," said James instructively, seating himself on the edge of the schoolroom table. "Because a thing was all right once, it doesn't mean it ought to go on for ever and ever. Things change, and it's all humbug and sentimentality to pretend one must go on in the dear old way long after it's become perfectly idiotic and unsuitable."
Zella had never heard her cousin so eloquent, and she felt a keen desire to show him, by some profound comment or sudden brilliant contribution of her own, that he had an audience fully capable of appreciating the depths of his remarks.
But James went on in a dictatorial manner that gave her no opportunity for uttering a word, even if she could have thought of anything sufficiently striking to say:
"The value of things alters, and what may mean something one year ceases to mean the same thing next year, or ten years hence. It's simply a form of rank insincerity to go on using old catchwords long after they've lost any appropriateness they may once have had."
Zella suddenly thought of an effective aphorism:
"Intellectual insincerity "she began.
"It's just the same," pursued James, unheeding, "as that ghastly habit mother has of Sunday evening talks, when we have to be solemn and holy and jaw about our own insides."
"James!" shrieked Muriel, acutely distressed," how can you say such hateful things and be so disloyal to mother?"
"It s not disloyal, as you call it," cried the boy contemptuously. "It's simple common-sense. Why, because it happens to be Sunday, should we have to go and sit in one particular corner of the drawing-room, and try and trump up something suitable to say, when we'd much rather not talk about our beastly feelings at all? It's sheer rank humbug."
"Intellectual insincerity"
"Nobody ought to want to talk about their own inside feelings after they're old enough to have any; and if they do, the sooner they learn to come off it, the better."
Zella suddenly felt that she understood why James had always been called a prig. Who was he, to speak with such an assumption of infallibility of what people ought or ought not to talk about? She felt, without formulating the idea into words, that she did like to talk about her own feelings, and immediately said aloud, " Of course, everybody hates talking about themselves, and I can't see why anyone should ever have to," because she was afraid lest James might think that his sweeping assertion applied to her.
"I'm rather under the impression that people don't hate talking about themselves at all," said James aggressively; "but they jolly well oughtn't to be allowed to, instead of being encouraged."
Zella thought that James wanted to be asked why, and immediately felt that wild-horses should not drag the question from her, but Muriel at once said: "But why, James?"
"Because it's an opportunity for posing and being sentimental, and every sort of insincere rot of that kind. People can't speak the truth about themselves."
"We don't all tell lies, thank you!" said Muriel, scandalized.
"You haven't understood a word I've said," her brother told her scathingly, as he got off the table.
"It all sounds horrid and wrong, and I don't want to, and neither does Zella."
"I understood absolutely," said Zella curtly.
"Oh, I knew that," remarked James unexpectedly.
Zella went to get ready for church with a curious mixture of gratification at James's remark, which appeared to point at appreciation of her understanding, and, on the other hand, a lurking dread lest it might merely have implied that he considered her a personally qualified judge of insincerity.
"James is always talking like that now," Muriel confided sadly to her cousin as they went downstairs together.
"Mother thinks he simply does it because he thinks it sounds clever, but she doesn't know half the things he says. James and mother don't get on, you know, Zella; though she says that when he is a little older he will understand what a mother's love really means—and of course he will. But it is a great pity, and does spoil things so."
"I don't see why it need spoil things for you," said Zella unsympathetically. She despised Muriel, and thought her point of view very childish and imitative.
"Of course it does. Look what a happy day Sunday ought to be, all going to church together like this, and yet it won't be a bit if James is tiresome."
Walking down the drive, Zella wondered why going to church together should be imbued with any special happiness. Her Uncle Henry looked rather more depressed than usual in his top-hat and black coat, and walked ahead with a now monosyllabic James; and Muriel, whose black Sunday boots were hurting her, lagged a few steps behind them.
Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, bearing a muff and a large Prayer Book bound in ivory, with a gilt clasp, struggled to keep her black skirts out of the mud, and told Zella to look where she was going to and not splash the puddles.
"Let me take your book, Aunt Marianne," said Zella obligingly.
"Where is your own, dear?"
Zella's ready flush sprang to her sensitive face. She did not possess a Prayer-Book.
In a flash she saw how shocking such an admission would sound. A Christian child, fourteen years of age, without a Prayer-Book, implying a past of churchless Sundays. . . . What would not be Aunt Marianne's horror at the revelation!
"Oh," she hesitated confusedly, "I—I must have forgotten it. How stupid of me!"
"Run back and fetch it at once, then," was the obvious rejoinder. Zella, who had not foreseen it, stood rooted to the spot.
"I—I don't always use one, and I don't suppose I shall need it," she stammered, scarlet and disconcerted.
"Not need your Prayer-Book in church!" said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, in scandalized accents. "Nonsense, my dear child! Run back for it at once; and be quick, or we shall be late."
Flight seemed so much easier than anything else that the unhappy Zella turned and hurried up the drive again without further words.
"Idiot that I am !" she thought to herself furiously. "What shall I do now? How can I find a Prayer-Book?"
She ran into the house and into her own room, and stood there with an impotent feeling of anger, and a despairing sense of being at once deceitful and inadequate to deceive.
The importance of producing a Prayer-Book began to assume monstrous proportions, and every second that flew by was keeping Aunt Marianne waiting.
"Perhaps Muriel has another one, and I can take it and tell Aunt Marianne I couldn't find mine."
She dashed into her cousin's room, and looked at the very small shelf where stood the slender stock of Muriel's literary possessions.
Nothing. A large Children's Bible with illustrations was the nearest approach to a work of devotion, and even in such an extremity was not to be regarded in the light of a possible companion for church.
Zella, in despair, wondered for an insane moment whether she could pretend sudden illness and declare herself unable to leave the house at all, but even as the idea crossed her mind she rejected it.
Rushing aimlessly back into her own room, she was horrified to see from the window her Aunt Marianne hastening up the drive towards the house.
Zella flew down the stairs and out at the door.
As she reached Mrs. Lloyd-Evans, who had relievedly turned back at the sight of her, Zella thrust both empty hands into her muff.
"I'm