Tony Last Character Analysis

When service was over he stood for a few minutes at the porch chatting affably with the vicar's sister and the people from the village. Then he returned home by a path across the fields which led to a side door in the walled garden; he visited the hothouses and picked himself a buttonhole, stopped by the gardeners' cottages for a few words (the smell of Sunday dinners rising warm and overpowering from the little doorways) and then, rather solemnly, drank a glass of sherry in the library. That was the simple, mildly ceremonious order of his Sunday morning, which had evolved, more or less spontaneously, from the more severe practices of his parents; he adhered to it with great satisfaction. Brenda teased him whenever she caught him posing as an upright, God-fearing gentleman of the old school and Tony saw the joke, but this did not at all diminish the pleasure he derived from his weekly routine, or his annoyance when the presence of guests suspended it.

“What's all the news?”

“Ben's put the rail up ever so high and Thunderclap and I jumped it six times yesterday and six times again to-day and two more of the fish in the little pond are dead, floating upside down all swollen and nanny burnt her finger on the kettle yesterday and daddy and I saw a fox just as near as anything and he sat quite still and then went away into the wood and I began drawing a picture of a battle only I couldn't finish it because the paints weren't right and the grey carthorse the one that had worms is quite well again”

“Nothing much has happened,” said Tony. “We've missed you. What did you find to do in London all this time?”

“You know there wasn't really much for her to do all the time at Hetton. Of course she'd rather die than admit it, but I believe she got a bit bored there sometimes. I've been thinking it over and that's the conclusion I came to. Brenda must have been bored…”

“Nothing could have been more fortunate,” Brenda said. “If I know Tony, he’ll be tortured with guilt for weeks to come.”

“But you can telephone her from here, can't you, daddy? Why did you go all the way to London to telephone her?... Why, daddy?”

“It would take too long to explain.”

“This has been a jolly weekend”

“I thought you were enjoying it”

“Just like the old times—before the economics began”

“I only wanted to see [Rev. Tendril] about arrangements. He tried to be comforting. It was very painful… after all the last thing one wants to talk about at a time like this is religion.”

“But it’s not true, is it?”

“Yes, I’m afraid it is. Everyone has known for some time.”

But it was several days before Tony fully realized what it meant. He had got into a habit of loving and trusting Brenda.

“How’s the old boy taking it?”

“Not so well. It makes me feel rather a beast,” said Brenda.

[Tony] reminded himself that phantasmagoric, and even gruesome as the situation might seem to him, he was nevertheless a host, so that he knocked at the communicating door and passed with a calm manner into his guest's room; for a month now he had lived in a world suddenly bereft of order; it was as though the whole reasonable and decent constitution of things, the sum of all he had experienced or learned to expect, were an inconspicuous, inconsiderable object mislaid somewhere on the dressing table; no outrageous circumstance in which he found himself, no new, mad thing brought to his notice, could add a jot to the all-encompassing chaos that shrieked about his ears.

He hung up the receiver and went back to the smoking-room. His mind had suddenly become clearer on many points that had puzzled him. A whole Gothic world had come to grief... there was now no armour glittering through the forest glades, no embroidered feet on the green sward; the cream and dappled unicorns had fled...

“You’re the explorer, aren’t you?”

“Yes, come to think of it, I suppose I am.”

For some days now Tony had been thoughtless about the events of the immediate past. His mind was occupied with the City, the Shining, the Many Watered, the Bright Feathered, the Aromatic Jam. He had a clear picture of it in his mind. It was Gothic in character, all vanes and pinnacles, gargoyles, battlements, groining and tracery, pavilions and terraces, a transfigured Hetton, pennons and banners floating on the sweet breeze, everything luminous and translucent; a coral citadel crowning a green hill-top sown with daisies, among groves and streams; a tapestry landscape filled with heraldic and fabulous animals and symmetrical, disproportionate blossom.

“Is it absolutely safe?”

“Oh, I imagine so. The whole world is civilized now, isn’t it—charabancs and Cook’s offices everywhere.”

“From now onwards the map is useless to us,” said Dr. Messinger with relish.

“I will tell you what I have learned in the forest, where time is different. There is no City. Mrs. Beaver has covered it with chromium plating and converted it into flats.”

“Do you believe in God?”

“I suppose so. I’ve never really thought about it much.”

When service was over he stood for a few minutes at the porch chatting affably with the vicar's sister and the people from the village. Then he returned home by a path across the fields which led to a side door in the walled garden; he visited the hothouses and picked himself a buttonhole, stopped by the gardeners' cottages for a few words (the smell of Sunday dinners rising warm and overpowering from the little doorways) and then, rather solemnly, drank a glass of sherry in the library. That was the simple, mildly ceremonious order of his Sunday morning, which had evolved, more or less spontaneously, from the more severe practices of his parents; he adhered to it with great satisfaction. Brenda teased him whenever she caught him posing as an upright, God-fearing gentleman of the old school and Tony saw the joke, but this did not at all diminish the pleasure he derived from his weekly routine, or his annoyance when the presence of guests suspended it.

“What's all the news?”

“Ben's put the rail up ever so high and Thunderclap and I jumped it six times yesterday and six times again to-day and two more of the fish in the little pond are dead, floating upside down all swollen and nanny burnt her finger on the kettle yesterday and daddy and I saw a fox just as near as anything and he sat quite still and then went away into the wood and I began drawing a picture of a battle only I couldn't finish it because the paints weren't right and the grey carthorse the one that had worms is quite well again”

“Nothing much has happened,” said Tony. “We've missed you. What did you find to do in London all this time?”

“You know there wasn't really much for her to do all the time at Hetton. Of course she'd rather die than admit it, but I believe she got a bit bored there sometimes. I've been thinking it over and that's the conclusion I came to. Brenda must have been bored…”

“Nothing could have been more fortunate,” Brenda said. “If I know Tony, he’ll be tortured with guilt for weeks to come.”

“But you can telephone her from here, can't you, daddy? Why did you go all the way to London to telephone her?... Why, daddy?”

“It would take too long to explain.”

“This has been a jolly weekend”

“I thought you were enjoying it”

“Just like the old times—before the economics began”

“I only wanted to see [Rev. Tendril] about arrangements. He tried to be comforting. It was very painful… after all the last thing one wants to talk about at a time like this is religion.”

“But it’s not true, is it?”

“Yes, I’m afraid it is. Everyone has known for some time.”

But it was several days before Tony fully realized what it meant. He had got into a habit of loving and trusting Brenda.

“How’s the old boy taking it?”

“Not so well. It makes me feel rather a beast,” said Brenda.

[Tony] reminded himself that phantasmagoric, and even gruesome as the situation might seem to him, he was nevertheless a host, so that he knocked at the communicating door and passed with a calm manner into his guest's room; for a month now he had lived in a world suddenly bereft of order; it was as though the whole reasonable and decent constitution of things, the sum of all he had experienced or learned to expect, were an inconspicuous, inconsiderable object mislaid somewhere on the dressing table; no outrageous circumstance in which he found himself, no new, mad thing brought to his notice, could add a jot to the all-encompassing chaos that shrieked about his ears.

He hung up the receiver and went back to the smoking-room. His mind had suddenly become clearer on many points that had puzzled him. A whole Gothic world had come to grief... there was now no armour glittering through the forest glades, no embroidered feet on the green sward; the cream and dappled unicorns had fled...

“You’re the explorer, aren’t you?”

“Yes, come to think of it, I suppose I am.”

For some days now Tony had been thoughtless about the events of the immediate past. His mind was occupied with the City, the Shining, the Many Watered, the Bright Feathered, the Aromatic Jam. He had a clear picture of it in his mind. It was Gothic in character, all vanes and pinnacles, gargoyles, battlements, groining and tracery, pavilions and terraces, a transfigured Hetton, pennons and banners floating on the sweet breeze, everything luminous and translucent; a coral citadel crowning a green hill-top sown with daisies, among groves and streams; a tapestry landscape filled with heraldic and fabulous animals and symmetrical, disproportionate blossom.

“Is it absolutely safe?”

“Oh, I imagine so. The whole world is civilized now, isn’t it—charabancs and Cook’s offices everywhere.”

“From now onwards the map is useless to us,” said Dr. Messinger with relish.

“I will tell you what I have learned in the forest, where time is different. There is no City. Mrs. Beaver has covered it with chromium plating and converted it into flats.”

“Do you believe in God?”

“I suppose so. I’ve never really thought about it much.”