It's no use, that woman beat hell out of me, and I feel limp anyway.
Let's go in.
Bravo.
I confess I came round the other way.
I was not sure about that door somehow.
They have been working on it all morning you know.
Well
Bravo!
Do you know your birthday is nineteen?
I'm very lucky.
No, we’re the lucky ones!
Cheers!
Your usual, sir? Scotch and tepid water, I think.
Thank you.
And for the lady?
Might I suggest a nip of champagne?
D'you know, the awful thing is I would like champagne very much.
I'll have some champagne too.
Very good, sir.
What a life of pleasure!
Roses, half and hour with a female pugilist
and now champagne!
I wish you wouldn't keep going on about the roses.
It wasn't my idea in the first place.
Someone sent them Celia.
Oh, that's quite different. That lets you out completely.
But it makes my massage worse.
Well, I did have the barber shave me in my room this morning.
I'm glad about the roses. Frankly, they were a shock.
They made me think we were starting the day on the wrong foot.
All the next day Julia and I spent together
without interruption, talking, sometimes scarcely moving
held by the swell of the sea.
After luncheon, the last hardy passengers
went to rest and we were alone
as though the place had been cleared for us
as though tact on a titanic scale had sent
everyone tiptoeing out to leave us to one another.
We thought papa might come back to England after mummy died.
Or that he might marry again.
But he lives just as he did.
Rex and I often go and see him now.
I've grown very fond of him.
And Sebastian?
He's disappeared completely.
Cordelia's in Spain with an ambulance.
Bridey leads his own extraordinary life.
He wanted to shut Brideshead after mummy died
but papa wouldn't hear of it for some reason
so Rex and I live there now.
And Bridey too?
He has two rooms next to Nanny Hawkins
part of the old nurseries.
One meets him sometimes coming out of the library
or on the stairs.
I never know when he's at home
and now and then he suddenly comes in to dinner
like a ghost, quite unexpectedly.
He's like a character from Chekov.
You know, Charles, Rex has never been unkind to me intentionally.
It's just that he isn't a real person at all.
He's a few faculties of a man highly developed.
The rest simply isn't there.
He couldn't imagine why it hurt me to find out
two months after we came back to London from our honeymoon
that he was still keeping up with Brenda Champion.
I was glad when I found Celia was unfaithful.
I felt it made it all right for me to dislike her.
Is she?
Do you?
I'm glad. I don't like her either.
Why did you marry her?
Physical attraction.
Ambition, everyone agrees, she's
the perfect wife for a painter.
Loneliness
Missing Sebastian
You loved him, didn't you?
Oh yes.
He was the forerunner.
She told me, as though fondly turning the pages
of an old nursery book, of her childhood.
And I lived long sunny days with her in the meadows
with Nanny Hawkins on her camp stool
and Cordelia asleep in the pram.
She told me of her life with Rex
and of the secret, vicious, disastrous escapade
that had taken her to New York.
She, too, had had her dead years.
At first
I used to stay away with Rex in his friends' houses.
He doesn't make me anymore.
He was ashamed of me when he found
I didn't cut the kind of figure he wanted
ashamed of himself for having been taken in.
I wasn't at all the article he bargained for.
He can't see the point of me
but whenever he's made up his mind there isn't a point
and he's begun to feel comfortable
he gets a surprise
some man, or even woman, he respects
takes a fancy to me and he suddenly sees that
there's a whole world of things
we understand and he doesn't.
He was upset when I went away.
He'll be delighted to have me back.
I was faithful to him until this last thing came along.
When, before dinner
she went to get ready
I came with her
uninvited
unopposed
expected.
I recalled the courtships of the past
ten dead years.
How, knotting my tie before setting out
putting the gardenia in my buttonhole
I would plan an evening of seduction
and think at such and such a time
at such and such an opportunity
I shall cross the start line
and open my attack for better
or worse.
'this phase of battle has gone on long enough", I would think
"a decision must be reached".
With Julia there were no phases.
No start line.
No tactic at all.
I'll see you at dinner.
There's nothing like a good upbringing.
Do you know, last year, when I thought
I was going to have a child, I'd decided
to have it brought up a Catholic.
I hadn't thought about religion before
I haven't since
but just at that time, when I was waiting for the birth
I thought
'that's the one thing I can give her'".
"It doesn't seem to have done me much good
but my child shall have it'.
It was odd
wanting to give something one had lost oneself.
Then in the end, I couldn't even give her that.
I couldn't even give her life.
I never saw her.
I was too ill to know what was going on
and afterwards, for a long time
until now
I didn't want to speak about her.
She was a daughter
so Rex didn't mind so much about her being dead.
We’d argued endlessly
about whether I should have a child in the first place.
At first, I wanted one.
After a year or so I discovered that I'd have to have an operation
to make it possible.
By that time Rex and I were out of love.
But he still wanted an heir.
It's late.
Perhaps we’d better go to bed.
I have been punished a little for marrying Rex.
I can't get all that sort of thing out of my mind, quite.
Death, Judgment, Heaven, Hell
Nanny Hawkins and the catechism.
It becomes part of oneself if they give it to one early enough.
And yet I wanted my child to have it.
Now I suppose I shall be punished for what I've just done.
Perhaps this is why you and I are here together like this.
Part of a plan.
No, Charles. Not yet.
Perhaps never.
I don't know.
I don't know if I want love.
Love?
I'm not asking for love.
Oh yes, Charles
You are.
Charles, are you there?
Yes.
I'll come in.
I've been asleep such a long while.
What time is it?
Half past three.
It's no better, is it?
It's worse.
I feel a little better, though.
Do you think they'd bring me some tea or something if I rang the bell?
I expect so.
Did you have an amusing evening?
Everyone's sick.
Poor Charles.
It was going to be such a lovely trip, too.
It may be better tomorrow.
Perhaps.
Next day the wind had dropped
and again we were wallowing in the swell.
That day
because we had talked so much the day before
and because what we had to say needed few words
we spoke little.
When, after long silences, we spoke at all
our thoughts we found
had kept pace together side by side.
you're standing guard over your sadness.
It's all I've earned.
You said so yesterday.
My wages
An IOU from life.
A promise to pay on demand.
The end of our day.
Let's go on deck.
Yes, now.
Oh dear, where can we hide
we, orphans of the storm?
Good morning. Morning, sir.
Charles!
Good morning.
I feel so well.
What do you think I'm having for breakfast?
Good Lord!
I've fixed up a visit to go to the hairdresser.
Do you know they couldn't take me till four o'clock this afternoon
they're so busy suddenly?
So I shan't appear till this evening
but all sorts of people are coming this morning to see us.
I've been a worthless wife to you these last few days.
What have you been up to?
Have you been behaving yourself?
You haven't been picking up sirens?
There was scarcely a woman about.
I have been talking to Julia.
Oh good.
I always wanted to get you two together.
She's one of my friends I knew you'd like.
You must have been a godsend to her.
She's been through a rather gloomy time lately.
I don't expect she mentioned it but
she got into trouble with an awful man.
I hear you've been looking after my husband for me.
Yes, we've become very matey.
Oh Charles, do let's go and see what's going on.
We'll catch you up.
What are your plans?
London for a bit.
Celia's going straight down to the country.
She wants to see the children.
You too?
No.
In London then.
Charles, this little red-haired man, Foulenough.
Did you see?
Two plain clothes police came and took him off.
I missed it.
There was such a crowd on that side of the ship.
I found out about trains and sent a telegram.
We shall be home by dinner.
The children will be asleep.
Perhaps we could wake John-John up, just this once.
You go down.
I really have to stay in London.
Oh, Charles, you must come. You haven't seen Caroline.
Will she change much in a week or two?
Darling, she changes every day.
Then where's the point of seeing her now?
I'm sorry, my dear
but I must get the pictures unpacked
so I can see how they've traveled.
I must get the exhibition fixed up.
Must you?
It's very disappointing.
Besides I don't know if Andrew and Cynthia will be out of the flat.
They took it to the end of the month.
I can go to a hotel.
But that's so grim.
I can't bear you to be alone
your first night home.
I'll stay and go down tomorrow.
No, you mustn't disappoint the children.
No.
Will you come down at the weekend?
If I can.
All British passport holders to the smoking room.
I've arranged for that sweet
Foreign Office man at our table
to get us off early.
Good.
Hello? Cavendish Hotel?
Mr. Charles Ryder, please.
Charles!
Are you off to the gallery?
I'm sick of the pictures already and never want to see them again
but I suppose I better put in an appearance.
Do you want me to come?
I'd much rather you didn't.
Celia sent a card with "Bring everyone. "
written across it in green ink.
When do we meet?
In the train.
You could pick up my luggage.
If you'll have it packed soon I'll pick you up too
and drop you at the gallery.
I've a fitting next door at twelve.
Lovely.
See you in about an hour then.
Bye.
Good morning, Mr. Fisher. Good morning, sir.
How's it going?
Now Charles, darling, do remember, be nice to the critics.
No one's come yet.
I've been here since ten and it's been very dull.
Who's car was that you came in?
Julia's.
Julia's?
Why didn't you bring her in?
Oddly enough I've just been talking about Brideshead
to a funny little man who seemed to know us well.
He said he was called Mr. Samgrass.
Apparently he's one of the Lord Copper's
middle aged young men on the Daily Beast.
I tried to feed him some paragraphs
but he seemed to know more about you than I do.
He said he'd met me years ago at Brideshead.
I wish Julia had come in, we could have asked her about him.
Well
Your whisky, darling.
Thank you.
I remember him.
He's a crook.
Yes
that stuck out a mile.
He's been talking about what he calls 'the Brideshead Set'.
Apparently, Rex Mottram has turned the place
into a next of party mutiny.
Did you know?
What would Teresa Marchmain have thought?
I'm going up there tonight.
No, not tonight, Charles.
You can't go tonight.
You're expected at home.
You promised, as soon as the exhibition was ready
you'd come home.
John-John and Nanny have made a banner with 'Welcome" on it.
And you haven't seen Caroline yet.
I'm sorry, it's all settled.
Besides
Daddy will think it so odd.
And Boy is home for Sunday.
And you haven't seen the new studio.
Charles, you can't go tonight.
Did they ask me?
Of course
but I knew you wouldn't be able to come.
No, I can't now.
I could have, if you'd let me know earlier
I should adore to see 'The Brideshead Set' at home.
I do think you're perfectly beastly but there is no time
for a family rumpus.
The Clarences said they'd look in before luncheon.
They may be here any minute.
Good.
Mr. Ryder? Pamela Lomax, Daily Mail.
Oh yes?
I wondered if I might have a word
Lovely to see you again.
What a very charming hat!
Oh sir, you are sweet.
Interesting this trip down the Amazon.
One of my brothers has just got back. Got pretty bitten.
Looking forward to seeing the pictures.
How kind of you to come, sir.
Very good to see you.
Ma'am.
Would you care for some champagne?
Not for me, thank you.
Pretty hot out there I should think.
Yes it was, sir.
Was it terribly uncomfortable?
Well, ma'am
there were one
or two sticky moments.
Awfully clever the way you've hit off
the impression of heat.
Makes me feel quite uncomfortable in my great coat.
A little bit closer. That's it. Fine, lovely.
Can you see the picture?
That's alright. I'm not interested in the picture.
That's fine. A tiny bit closer
Lovely.
Now smile, please.
How kind, sir John. I'm delighted to hear it.
Charles, Charles.
Sir John has been saying the most marvelous things about you.
Good. I'm glad.
Yes, I think it's safe to say
we can look forward to
another Ryder at the Tate.
And now, if I may, I'd like to mark down
the following ones for further consideration.
Number seven.
You see, Charles lives for one thing
beauty.
I think he got bored with finding it ready made in England
he had to go and create it for himself.
He wanted new worlds to conquer.
After all, he has said the last word
about country houses, really, hasn't he?
Not that I mean that he's given up that altogether.
I'm sure he'll always do one or two more for friends.
From fashionable and unfashionable
lips alike
I heard fragments of praise.
They all thought they had found something new.
It had not been thus at my last exhibition
in these same rooms shortly before going abroad.
Then there had been an unmistakable note of weariness.
Then the talk had been less of me
than of the houses, anecdotes of their owners.
I remembered that last exhibition too, for another reason.
It was the week I had detected
my wife in adultery.
Then, as now, she was a tireless hostess.
Whenever I see anything lovely nowadays
a building
I think to myself, that's by Charles.
Throughout our married life
again and again
I had felt my bowels shrivel within me
at the things she said.
But today
in this gallery
I heard her unmoved
and suddenly realized
that she was powerless to hurt me anymore.
I was a free man.
She had given me my manumission in that brief, sly lapse of hers.
My cuckold’s horns made me
Lord of the Forest.
Darling, I must go.
It's been a terrific success, hasn't it?
I'll think of something to tell them at home
but I wish it hadn't had to happen quite like this.
Good afternoon.
No, I have not brought a card of invitation.
I do not even know
whether I received one.
I have not come to a social function.
I do not seek to scrape acquaintances with Lady Celia.
I do not want my photograph in the Tatler.
I have not come to exhibit myself.
I've come to see the pictures.
Perhaps you are unaware that
there are any pictures here.
I happen to have a personal interest in the artist
if that word has any meaning to you.
Antoine!
Come in!
My dear
there's a gorgon here
who thinks I'm gate crashing.
Dear Charles.
How are you?
I only arrived in London yesterday and I heard
quite by chance at luncheon
that you were having an exhibition
so of course I dashed impetuously to the shrine
to pay homage.
Have I changed?
Would you recognize me?
Where are the pictures?
Let me explain them to you.
Where, my dear Charles
did you find this sumptuous greenery?
In the corner of some hot house
at Trent of Tring?
What gorgeous usurer nurtured these fronds
for your pleasure?
I've been to South America for two years
haven't you heard? I know all about that.
But they tell me, my dear
that you are happy in love
and that is everything, is it not?
Or nearly everything.
Are they as bad as that?
My dear
let us not expose your little imposture
before these good plain people.
Let us not spoil
their innocent pleasure.
We know, you and I, that this is
all terrible tripe.
Let us go, before we offend the connoisseurs.
I know of a louche little bar quite near here.
Let's go there and talk of your other
conquests.
Goodbye, sir.
Thank you for ever.
Not quite your milieu, my dear
but mine, I assure you.
After all, you have been in your
milieu all day.
I was given the address by a dirty old man in the
Boeuf sur le Toit.
I'm most grateful to him.
I've been out of England
so long
and really sympathetic little joints like this
change so fast.
I presented myself here for the first time yesterday evening
and already I feel quite at home.
Good evening, Cyril.
Lo Toni, back again?
Can't keep away, my dear.
What are you having, dear?
What would you like, Charles?
Gin and dry Vermouth, please.
Two of those please.
Hello, Tony. Good evening.
How are you? Fine, thank you.
Do you know Mr. Charles Ryder, the artist?
Pleased to meet you.
How do you do?
Thank you.
We'll take our drinks and sit down.
You must remember, my dear, that here you are just
as conspicuous and may I say abnormal
my dear, as I should be in
Bratt's Club.
Would your friend care to rhumba?
No, Tom
he would not
and I'm not going to give you a drink
not yet, anyway.
That's a very impudent boy
a regular
little gold digger, my dear.
Well, Antoine
What have you been up to all these years?
My dear, it's what you've been up to that we're here to talk about.
I've been watching you, my dear.
I'm a faithful, old body
and I've kept my eye on you.
I went to your first exhibition, my dear.
I found it
charming.
There was an interior of Marchmain House
very English, very correct, but quite delicious.
"Charles has done something" I said
"not all he will do, not all he can do
but something".
Even then, my dear, I wondered a little.
It seemed to me there was something a little gentlemanly about your painting.
You must remember, my dear, that I am not English.
I cannot understand
this keen zest to be well-bred.
English snobbery is even more
macabre to me even
than English morals.
However, I said, "Charles has done
something delicious. What will he do next?"
Imagine then my excitement at your luncheon today.
Everyone was talking about you.
How you had broken away my dear
gone to the Tropics, become a Gaugin, a Rimbaud.
You can imagine how my old heart lept.
"Poor Celia", they said
"after all she's done for him".
"He owes everything to her. It's too bad".
"And with Julia" they said
"after the way she behaved in America
and just as she was going back to Rex".
"But the pictures', I said 'tell me about them".
"Oh the pictures', they said
'they're most peculiar".
"Not at all what he usually does'.
"Very
forceful, quite barbaric".
"I call them down-right unhealthy"
said Mrs. Stuyvesant Oglander.
My dear, I could hardly keep still in my chair.
I wanted to dash out of the house
and leap in a taxi
and say 'take me to Charles' unhealthy pictures'.
Well, my dear, I went
and what did I find?
I found a very naughty and
successful practical joke.
It reminded me of dear Sebastian
when he like so much to dress up in
false whiskers.
It was charm again, my dear.
Simple
creamy, English charm
playing tigers.
You're quite right.
Of course I'm right, my dear.
I was right years ago
more years, I am happy to say
than either of us shows
when I warned you.
I took you out to dinner to warn you of charm.
I warned you expressly and in great detail
of the Flyte family.
Charm is the great English blight.
It does not exist outside these damp islands.
It spots and kills anything it touches.
It kills love.
It kills art
and I greatly fear, my dear Charles
that it has killed you.
It's nice seeing you again, Anthony.
I've got to go. I've got a train to catch.
Dommage.
I so enjoy our little talks together.
A bientot, Charles.
Don't be a tease, Toni.
Buy me a drink.
Alright.
This way m'lady. Thank you.
Charles
Hello, darling.
I'll just go and make sure the luggage is safely stowed.
Thank you.
I thought you'd missed the train.
It seems days since I saw you.
Six hours.
And we were together all yesterday.
You look worn out.
It's been a nightmare of a day.
Crowds, critics
and the Clarence’s
ending up with half an hours well reasoned abuse
about my pictures in a pansy bar.
I think Celia knows about us.
She had to know sometime.
Would you care for a drink before dinner, madam?
Two very dry Martinis, please.
Yes, sir.
Everyone seems to know.
My pansy friend had only been in London twenty four hours
before he'd found out.
Damn everybody.
Yes, but what about Rex?
Rex isn't anybody at all.
He just doesn't exist.
Julia.
Charles.
What we want is a showdown.
Wouldn't work with Baldwin.
Baldwin's too canny.
Baldwin's too clever
and Baldwin can rig it.
A chap just came from Fort Belvedere
and what he said was very interesting.
absolutely true.
Chap I know in the Foreign Office
swears it's a fact that Franco's a German agent.
Bring some more whisky, Rogers.
Yes, sir.
Charles!
Excuse me.
Good to see you.
Grizel's here somewhere.
She saw your show this morning.
Very impressed
impressed with what she calls
your new style.
Help yourself.
I must say, Charles
the murals look as handsome as ever.
That was a long time ago.
You seem to have a pretty good set up here.
It's a very happy arrangement.
Well, it suits me down to the ground.
The old boy keeps up the house
and Bridey takes care of the feudal stuff
you know, with the tenants.
I have the run of the house rent free.
All it costs me is the food and wages for the indoor servants.
Couldn't be fairer than that, could it?
Rex! Come and support me.
Come and stop Ronnie losing a bet.
He's put his shirt on Baldwin winning.
Do you know Henry and Ronnie Nash?
Come on over and say hello.
I'll join you in a minute.
What I'm saying, of course, is that now he can marry her
and make her Queen tomorrow.
Would you mind awfully not doing that?
Why not?
I don't much enjoy it.
Who cares about divorces these days, anyway?
A few old maids?
Good evening.
Charles!
Hello Grizel.
You were pretty nippy getting up here.
That exhibition of yours this morning was divine.
You enjoyed it?
I adored it.
And how's that lovely Celia? She's well.
Julia
Darling, you've lost weight.
And it suits you.
Goodness you look more stunning than ever.
I could spit.
Hello everybody.
Do carry on.
I'm sorry I wasn't here to greet you.
I hope Rex is taking care of you all.
Good evening Henry
Evening, darling.
You look lovely. Thank you.
My dear
you look simply marvelous.
Thank you so much.
Good evening.
Hello. Hello.
I guess you've been gambling tonight.
How was it?
Lost about £4,000.
Hello.
I wonder which is the more horrible
Celia's Art and Fashion
or Rex's Politics and Money.
Why worry about them?
Oh, my darling
why is it that love makes me hate the world?
It's supposed to have quite the opposite effect.
I feel as though all mankind, and God too
were in a conspiracy against us.
They are.
But we've got our happiness in spite of them.
Here and now.
We've taken possession of it.
They can't hurt us, can they?
Not now.
Not tonight.
Not for how many nights?