When I left Sebastian in Morocco
I had intended to return directly to Paris
but the business of his allowance
meant that I had to travel to London
to see Bridey.
We met in the library of Marchmain House.
Do you consider there is anything vicious
about my brother's connection with this German?
No.
I'm sure not.
It's simply a case of two waifs coming together.
You say he's a criminal?
A 'criminal type'.
He's been in a military prison
and he was dishonourably discharged.
And the doctor says Sebastian is killing himself with drink.
Weakening himself.
He hasn't D.T.'s or cirosis.
He's not insane?
Certainly not.
He's found a companion he happens to like
and a place that he happens to like living in.
Then he must have his allowance as you suggest.
The thing is quite clear.
Would you like to paint this house?
My father wants it done for a record
to be kept at Brideshead.
One picture of the front
one of the back from the park
one of the staircase
and one of the large drawing room.
Four small oils.
I don't know any painters.
Julia said you specialist in architecture.
Yes.
I should like to very much.
You know they're pulling it down?
My father's selling it.
They're going to put up a block of flats here.
They're keeping the name.
We can't stop them, apparently.
What a very sad thing.
Well, of course I'm sorry.
But do you think it good architecturally?
One of the most beautiful houses I know.
I can't see it. I've always thought it rather ugly.
Perhaps your pictures will make me see it differently.
I began in the long drawing room
for they were anxious to shift the furniture
which had stood there since it was built.
I set out the perspective in pencil
but held back from the painting
like a diver on the water's edge.
Once in, I found myself buoyed
and exhilarated.
I was normally a slow and deliberate painter.
That afternoon and all next day, and the day after
I worked fast.
I could do nothing wrong.
At the end of each passage I paused, tense, afraid to start the next
fearing like a gambler that luck must turn
and the pile be lost.
But bit by bit, minute by minute
the thing came into being.
There were no difficulties.
The intricate multiplicity of light and colour
became a whole
each brush stroke, as soon as it was complete
seemed to have been there always.
May I stay here and watch?
Yes
so long as you don't talk.
This was my first commission.
I had to work against time, for the contractors
were only waiting for the final signature
to start their work of destruction.
In spite, or perhaps because of that, for it is my vice to spend
too long on a canvas, never content to leave well alone.
Those four paintings of Marchmain House
are particular favourites of mine
and it was their success both with myself and others
that confirmed me in what has since been my career.
It must be lovely to be able to do that.
It is.
I'm tired.
I bet you are.
Is it finished?
Practically.
I shall have to go over it again in the morning.
Do you know it's almost dinner time?
There's no one here to cook anything now.
I only came up today.
I didn't realise how far the decay had gone.
You wouldn't take me out to dinner, would you?
All right.
Thank you.
I'll go and get changed.
We left by the side door
and walked to the restaurant.
You've seen Sebastian? Yes, I have.
He won't come home even now.
I didn't realise you understood so much.
Well, I love him more than anyone.
It's sad about Marchers, isn't it?
Very sad.
Do you know they're going to build a block of flats?
And that Rex wants to take
what he called a 'penthouse' at the top?
Isn't that like him?
Poor Julia, that was too much for her.
He couldn't understand at all. He thought she'd like
to keep up with the old home.
Things have all come to an end very quickly, haven't they?
Apparently, Papa has been terribly in debt for a long time
and selling Marchers has put him straight again.
But what's going to happen to you? What indeed?
There are all kinds of suggestions.
Aunt Fanny Roscommon wants me to live with her
and then Rex and Julia talk of taking over half of Brideshead
and living there. But won't your father come back?
We thought he might
but no.
They closed the chapel at Brideshead.
Did they?
Bridey and the Bishop.
Mummy's Requiem was the last mass said there.
After she was buried, the priest came in
I was there alone.
I don't think he saw me.
He took up the altar stone and put it in his bag
then he burnt the wads of wool with the holy oil on them
and threw the ash outside.
He emptied the Holy water stoup
blew out the lamp in the sanctuary
and left the tabernacle open and empty
as though from now on it was always to be Good Friday.
I suppose none of this makes any sense to you, Charles.
Poor agnostic.
I stayed there till he was gone.
Then suddenly, there wasn't any chapel there any more.
Just an oddly decorated room.
I can't tell you what it felt like.
You've never been to Tenenbrae, I suppose?
No.
Well, if you had
you would know how the Jews feel about that Temple.
"Quomodo sedet sola civitas".
It's a beautiful chant.
You ought to go there once, just to hear it.
Are you still trying to convert me, Cordelia?
No. That's all over, too.
Do you know what papa said when he became a Catholic?
Mummy told me once.
He said "You have brought back my
family to the faith of their ancestors. "
Pompous, you know.
It takes people in different ways.
Anyhow, the family haven't been
very constant, have they?
There's him gone
Sebastian gone
Julia gone.
But God won't let them go for long you know.
I wonder if you remember the story that Mummy read us
the evening Sebastian first got drunk
I mean, that bad evening.
Father Brown? Yes.
He said something like
"I caught him, the thief, with an unseen hook
and an invisible line, which is long enough to let him wander
to the ends of the world and still bring him back
with a twitch upon the thread. "
First time I've ever been taken out to dinner alone at a restaurant.
Do you know what Julia said when
she heard about Marchmain being sold?
She said
"Poor Cordelia won't have her coming out ball here after all. "
It's a thing we used to talk about, like me being her bridesmaid.
That didn't come off either.
When Julia had her ball
I was allowed down for an hour
to sit in the corner with Aunt Fanny
and she said to me
"In six years time, you'll have all this!"
I hope I've got a vocation.
I don't know what that means.
It means you can be a nun.
If you haven't a vocation it's no good
however much you want to be, and if you have a vocation
you can't get away from it, however much you hate it.
Bridey thinks he has a vocation and hasn't.
I used to think Sebastian had and hated it
but I don't know now.
Everything has changed so much suddenly.
You'll fall in love.
Oh, I pray not.
I say, do you think I could have another
one of those scrumptious meringues?
My theme is memory
that winged host that soared about me
one grey morning of war time.
These memories which are my life
for we possess nothing certainly, except the past
were always with me.
For nearly ten dead years after that evening with Cordelia
I was borne along a road outwardly full of change and incident
but never during that time, except sometimes in my painting
did I come alive as I had been during the time
of my friendship with Sebastian.
I became an architectural painter.
But as the years passed
I began to mourn the loss of something
I had known in the drawing room of Marchmain House.
The intensity and singleness
and the belief that it was not all done by hand.
In a word, the inspiration.
In quest of this fading light, I went abroad
travelling by slow but not easy stages
through Mexico and Central America.
There, in great labour, sickness
and occasionally in some danger, I made the first drawings
for Ryder's Latin America.
I was in no great pains to keep in touch with England.
I followed local advice for my itinerary
and had no settled route
so that much of my mail never reached me
and the rest accumulated
until there was more than could be read at one sitting.
But despite this isolation and this long sojourn
in a strange world, I remained unchanged
still a small part of myself
pretending to be whole.
I discarded the experiences of those two years with my tropical kit
and returned to New York, as I had set out.
Ritchie!
I have a suite booked.
The name is Ryder. Yes, sir.
Has my wife arrived yet?
646 and 7. Mr. And Mrs. Charles Ryder.
Your wife has checked in, sir.
Would you care to sign the register, please?
Your wife went out earlier, sir.
She said to say she'd be back after lunch.
Thank you.
No, sir. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Thank you, sir.
Goodnight. Goodnight.
I don't believe you read my letters.
Well, some of them went astray.
I remember distinctly your telling me
that the daffodils in the orchard were a dream
and that the new nursery maid was a jewel
but frankly I cannot remember you telling
that your new baby was called Caroline.
Why did you call it that?
After Charles, of course.
I made Bertha Van Halt godmother.
I thought she was safe for a good present.
What do you think she gave?
Bertha Van Halt's a well known trap.
What?
A fifteen shilling book token.
Now that John-John has a companion
Who?
Your son, darling. You haven't forgotten him, too?
Why do you call him that?
It's the name he invented for himself.
Don't you think it's sweet?
Now that John-John has a companion, I think we'd better
not have any more for some time, don't you?
Just as you like.
John-John talks about you such a lot.
He prays every night for your safe return.
I hope you admire my self-restraint.
Restraint?
I'm not asking any awkward questions.
I may say I've been tormented by visions of voluptuous half-casts
ever since you went away.
But I'm determined not to ask
and I haven't.
That suits me.
Shall I put my face to bed?
No, not just yet.
I don't believe you've changed at all, Charles.
No, I'm afraid not.
Do you want to change?
It's the only evidence of life.
But you might change so that you didn't love me anymore.
There is that risk.
Charles?
You haven't stopped loving me?
You said yourself I hadn't changed.
Well, I'm beginning to think you have.
I haven't. No.
No, I can see that.
Were you at all frightened at meeting me today?
Not the least.
You didn't wonder if I should have fallen in love with someone else
in the meantime? No.
Have you?
You know I haven't.
Have you?
No
I'm not in love.
Oh, bloody central heating!
Lights out?
The garden's come on a lot.
The box-hedges you planted grew five inches last year.
Of course, darling, I can see your new pictures are perfectly brilliant
and really rather beautiful in a sinister way
but, somehow, I don't feel they're quite you.
We've got a first-class cook at the moment
we're really impressed.
Just like old times.
I'm not worrying anymore, Charles.
Good.
I was so terribly afraid that two years might have made a difference.
Now I know we can start again exactly where we left off.
When?
What?
When we left off what?
When you went away, of course.
You're not thinking of something else, a little time before?
Oh Charles, that's old history.
It was nothing.
It was never.
It's all over and forgotten.
I just wanted to know.
So we're back where we were the day I went abroad, is that it?
So we started that day exactly
where we left off two years before
with my wife in tears.
Hello?
In the dressing room, please.
Charles! I'm just arranging our little party this evening.
Julia!
Celia, Celia Ryder.
Oh, it's lovely to find you on board.
What have you been up to?
Come and have a cocktail this evening and tell me all about it
Good. See you then.
Julia who?
Mottram.
I haven't seen her for years.
Hello? Operator
I'd not seen Julia since the private view of my first exhibition
where the four canvasses of Marchmain House, lent by Bridey
had hung together attracting much attention.
Those pictures were my last contact with the Flytes.
Our lives, so close for a year or two
had drawn apart.
Sebastian, I knew, was still abroad.
Rex and Julia I sometimes heard it said, were unhappy together.
Rex was not prospering quite as well as had been expected.
I saw their faces now and again, peeping from the Tatler
but they and I had fallen apart into separate worlds.
Can I get you anything, sir?
A whisky soda, no ice.
I'm sorry, sir. All the soda's iced.
Is the water iced? Oh yes, sir.
That will do.
Charles.
Hello.
I heard you were here. Celia telephoned to me.
It's delightful.
Will you join me for a drink? Thank you.
What are you doing? Waiting
my maid's unpacking.
She's been so disagreeable ever since we left England.
She's complaining now about the cabin.
I can't think why. It seems the lap of luxury to me.
He brought two jugs.
One of iced water, the other of boiling water.
I mixed them to the right temperature.
I'll remember that's how you take it, sir.
Thank you.
What can I get for you, madam?
Oh, a hot chocolate. Very good, madam.
I never see you now. I never see anyone I like.
I can't think why.
What have you been doing in America?
Don't you know?
I'll tell you about it sometime.
I've been a mug. I thought I was in love with someone
but it didn't quite work out that way.
What about you, Charles? What have you been up to?
Oh, I've just been painting
trying different styles.
I'm just back from a trip.
Where have you been?
Mexico, Central America
quite a way from anywhere.
I felt I needed a change of scene. I was getting stale.
It sounds thrilling. I'm longing to see the pictures.
Celia wanted me to unpack them and stick them around the cabin
for her cocktail party but I couldn't do that.
No
Is Celia as pretty as ever?
I always thought she had the most delicious looks of any girl in our year.
She hasn't changed.
You have, Charles.
So lean and grim
not at all the pretty boy Sebastian brought home with him.
Harder, too.
And you're softer.
Yes, I think so.
And more patient now.
And sadder, too.
Oh yes, much sadder.
Facing in to the room, please.
My wife was in exuberant spirits
when, two hours later
I returned to the cabin.
There you are. I've had to do everything.
How does it look?
You must go and get dressed. Where've you been all this time?
Talking to Julia Mottram.
Do you know her?
Oh, of course, you were a friend of the dipso brother.
Goodness her glamour!
She greatly admires your looks, too.
She used to be a girlfriend of Boy's.
Surely not?
He always said so.
Have you considered how your guests are going to eat this caviar?
I have.
It's insoluble.
But I suppose there's always this.
Anyway, people always find ways of eating things at parties.
Do you remember how we once ate potted shrimps with a paper knife?
Did we?
Darling.
It was the night you popped the question in.
As I remember it, you popped.
Well, the night we got engaged.
Well, you haven't said what you think of the arrangements.
It's a cinema actor's dream.
Cinema actors! That's what I want to talk about.
Charles, I've been thinking.
I do believe you're absolutely cut out to be a set designer for the cinema.
I've invited two very important American's, real Hollywood magnates.
Do promise you'll be sensible and talk to them.
Ah, here is Father Christmas. Dear Lady Celia
Is everything alright, madam?
We were just in raptures over your swan.
If you'll put on your warmest clothes
and come on an expedition with me to the cold storage
I can show you a whole Noah's Ark full of such objects.
The toast for the caviar will be along shortly.
They're keeping it hot.
Toast! Do you hear that, Charles?
Toast!
I do believe you've taken against my swan.
We were just Now don't be beastly about
it in front of the purser.
I think it was sweet of him to think of it.
You know, if Charles had read about it in a description of a 16th century
banquet in Venice, he would have said 'those were the days to live".
In sixteenth century Venice, it would have been a somewhat different shape.
Hello, how are you? I'm so glad you could come.
Celia, what a beautiful swan! Isn't it heavenly?
Well, I hate to spoil the fun, but it looks like we're in for a storm.
How can you be so beastly?
Anyway, storms don't affect a ship this size, do they?
Well, it might hold us back a bit. But it won't make us sick?
That depends on how good a sailor you are.
I'm always sick in storms, ever since I was a boy.
I don't believe a word of it, he's simply being sadistic.
I must show you the photographs of the children.
Do you know Charles hasn't even seen Caroline yet?
Isn't it thrilling for him? How old is she now?
I'm Gloria Stuyvesant Oglander. I feel I know you through and through
Celia's told me so much about you.
There were no friends of mine here
but I knew about a third of the party
and talked a way civilly enough.
But all the time I thought only of
when Julia would come.
Been waiting to do that for a long time.
Bet you don't know how many drops to the minute.
I do. I've counted.
I've no idea. Well, guess.
Go on, a tenner if you get it wrong and half a dollar if you get it right.
That's fair isn't it? Three.
Coo
you're a sharp chap, aren't you?
Been counting too, haven't you?
Tell me, how do you work this one out?
I'm an Englishman born and bred
this is my first time on the Atlantic.
You flew out? No.
You came round the world the other way and across the Pacific.
You are a sharp chap and no mistake.
I've made quite a bit out of arguing on that topic.
Well
I better skedaddle.
Toodle loo.
Still, Julia didn't come.
And the noise of twenty people in that tiny room
was the noise of a multitude.
Charles, this is Mr. Kramm of International Films.
So you are Mr. Charles Ryder.
Yes. Well, well, well.
Our purser says we're in for some pretty dirty weather.
What do you know about that?
Rather less than the purser.
I'm sorry, Mr. Ryder. I don't quite get you?
I mean I know less about that than
the purser. Is that so?
knowing that we should meet again in half an hour
I've enjoyed our talk.
I hope it'll be the first of many.
You must promise to bring that distinguished looking husband
of yours to my little do on Tuesday. Oh, we'd love to.
Do tell me, how did if feel meeting Celia after two years?
I know that I should feel indecently bridal.
But then Celia has never quite got the
orange blossom out of her hair, has she?
Julia never came?
No, she telephoned.
I couldn't quite hear what she said, there was so much noise going on.
Something about a dress.
It was quite lucky, actually, there wasn't room for a cat.
It was a lovely party, wasn't it?
Did you hate it very much?
You behaved beautifully and you looked so distinguished.
Who was your red haired chum?
No chum of mine? How very peculiar.
Did you say anything to Mr. Kramm about working in Hollywood?
Of course not.
Oh Charles. You are such a worry to me.
It's no good just standing around looking distinguished and being a martyr for Art.
Come on. Let's go to dinner.
We're at the Captain's table. I don't suppose he'll dine down tonight
but it's polite to be fairly punctual.
I just hope I can find the dining room. This place is an absolute maze.
We were a gruesome circle at dinner.
Even my wife's high social spirit faltered.
Wherever Celia is, you'll find she knows all the significant people.
I'm miserable about the party.
My beastly maid totally disappeared with every frock I have.
She only turned up half an hour ago.
I have made it my aim to reconcile the so-called Anarchist
and the so-called Communists.
There is no fundamental diversity in their ideologies.
It is a matter of personality, Mr. Ryder
and what personalities have put asunder
personalities may unite.
Of course. But I understood you to say
Lady Celia that you were unacquainted with him.
I meant that he was like Captain Foulenough.
Ah, I begin to comprehend.
He impersonates this friend of yours in order to come to your party.
No, no. Captain Foulenough is simply a comic character
in an English paper.
You know, like your "Popeye".
To recapitulate
an imposter came to your party
and you admitted him
because of a fancied resemblance
to a fictitious character in a cartoon.
Yes, I suppose that was it, really.
Do you not agree, Mr. Ryder?
Yes yes. What are words?
What indeed.
My mind reeled.
After the months of solitude, this was too much.
I felt like Lear on the heath
like the Duchess of Malfi bayed by madmen.
I summoned cataracts and hurricanes and, as if by conjury
the call was immediately answered.
Either I am a little drunk or it's getting rough.
This is where I say goodnight to you all.
Like King Lear.
Only each of us is all three of them.
What can you mean?
Lear, Kent, Fool.
Oh dear, it's like that agonizing Foulenough conversation over again.
Don't try and explain.
I'm not sure that I could.
Well, we've set a fine example of British phlegm.
But I think I've taken all I can.
This is making my headache and I'm tired, anyway.
I'm going to bed.
Are you coming, Julia?
Yes.
Will you be joining in the tombola this evening, sir?
No, no, thank you.
But if somebody could bring me some more brandy?
Certainly, sir. I'll get a steward for you.
Charles? Is that you?
Yes.
I feel terrible.
I didn't know a ship of this size could pitch like this.
Can't you do something?
Can't you get something from the doctor?
I'll call the steward. He'll have something.
Look, why don't I sleep next door? Then I won't disturb you.
Excuse me, sir, but these have come for you and her Ladyship.
What would you like me to do with them, sir?
Oh, put them over there.
What news of the storm?
Well, the wind's dropped a little, sir, but it's still blowing quite hard
and there's a heavy swell.
Nothing like a heavy swell for the enjoyment of the passengers.
There weren't many breakfasts wanted this morning.
Just a moment, Steward.
Would you have these delivered to Lady Mottram's cabin?
Certainly, sir.
And Steward
Would you ask the barber to call?
Very good, sir.
Thank you. Hello?
Charles! What a deplorable thing to do. How unlike you!
Don't you like them?
What can I do with roses on a day like this?
Smell them.
They've got absolutely no smell at all.
What have you had for breakfast?
Muscat grapes and cantaloupe.
When am I going to see you?
Before lunch?
I'm busy till then with a masseuse.
A masseuse? Yes. Isn't it peculiar?
I've never had one before, except once, when I hurt my shoulder hunting.
What is it about being on a boat that makes everyone behave
like a film star?
I don't.
How about these very embarrassing roses?
I'll see you on the deck about twelve thirty.
Marvelous. You might not recognize me.
What do you mean?
I'm having my beard removed.
How dreadful. It sounds like an operation.
Can I come in?
I thought these might cheer you up.
How sweet people are.
I take it you're not going to get up.
Oh no
Mrs. Clark is being so sweet.
Don't bother.
Come in and tell me what's going on sometimes.
Not now, my dear. The less we are disturbed today the better.
Charles
your beard.
Yes, I know.
What a pity. I thought it looked so distinguished.