Chapter Four
Mr. Thomas Greenley, had he but realized it, was as much of a rarity as the odd exotic plants and depressingly ugly orchids with which he filled the greenhouses and the borders in his splendid garden at Cleeve Manor. True, he was neither ugly nor exotic; his fame did not consist in his having been discovered on a windswept ledge of the Himalayas or in the gloomy fever-ridden swamps of some Amazonian jungle and transported at great expense to a situation where the mere fact of his survival was a cause for wonder and congratulation.
Compared with his plants he was commonplace and practically static. But he had other qualities not less remarkable than theirs, qualities indeed more easily assessable by his neighbours, few of whom were capable of judging a plant except by its beauty, its usefulness, or its size.
Mr. Greenley was very rich, comparatively young, and unmarried.
The difficulty was that hardly anybody knew him. When he had first bought Cleeve Manor, home of the three old Misses Cleeve who now lived at Box Cottage, rumours of his wealth and the fact that he came from London and had no connexion with anyone in the county caused him to be branded as an upstart, perhaps a profiteer, seeking to establish himself in an isolated district where neither his ancestors nor his former associates could be held against him. It somehow got about that he was married (perhaps because Cleeve Manor seemed so unsuited to a bachelor), and mothers of families, who might have been tempted by his wealth and the thought of their unmarried daughters, remained aloof.
Had Mr. Greenley wished he could, of course, have overcome this opposition, which in any case dwindled as soon as it was known that no Mrs. Greenley existed. But he showed no particular desire to fraternize with his neighbours. He did not shoot, he did not fish, he had apparently little interest in country pursuits. Moreover he was often away from home, for he was still actively engrossed in the business—variously supposed to be armaments, stockbroking, or simply money-lending—which provided him with his wealth.
He came down to Cleeve Manor usually at week-ends, and usually alone. He never went to church. Very few people managed to become acquainted with Mr. Greenley, and those who did reported that he was pleasant, but dull, and that if asked to do anything he invariably excused himself by saying that he was a busy man. It was evident that Mr. Greenley had not been brought up on the principle of noblesse oblige.
When he wanted anything he set about getting it in the simplest possible way. He wanted a puppy for his niece, so he wrote to Miss Selbourne, who advertised each week in the local press, to say that he would call on Saturday afternoon to buy a puppy. He intended that after he had chosen it Miss Selbourne herself should be responsible for delivering it at Sunningdale, where his niece lived.
It was about four o’clock when Gillian heard the car stop outside in the lane. She walked slowly down to the gate, letting Agnes and Leo run ahead so that she could see Mr. Greenley’s reactions to dogs. Mr. Greenley’s reactions kept him on the far side of the gate. This was reassuring, as it probably meant that he knew no more about dogs than she did herself.
“Good afternoon,” she said, and went on to explain who she was and the reason for Miss Selbourne’s absence. He had of course forgotten about the dog show. He said with formal politeness that he hoped she had not stayed away from it on his account.
“I was rather glad of an excuse for staying away,” Gillian assured him. “I think dogs are only bearable in small quantities. The more there are, the sooner one gets bored.”
This pleased him. From the little he had seen of his neighbours he had supposed that everyone living in the country was insanely devoted to dogs, silly, destructive animals in his opinion, and he had been prepared to endure a spate of enthusiastic nonsense from some weather-beaten female in a white coat and a hard felt hat. For Mr. Greenley pigeonholed his fellow creatures, and for each category he had a mental picture, a stock figure as it were, to which he expected the reality would correspond.
“Perhaps I shouldn’t say that,” Gillian continued. “It’s not very businesslike, is it, when you’ve come here to buy a dog?”
She laughed, and Mr. Greenley laughed too, for no particular reason.
“Even one dog would bore me,” he said boldly. “I’m getting this puppy for my niece.”
“You’d better come up to the kennels and choose it. These two are quite tame. They’ll jump up at you, but they won’t bite.”
The conversation had been conducted across the rickety little gate. Gillian now opened the gate and Mr. Greenley came inside. Agnes and Leo hurled themselves upon him with wild barks of enthusiasm, but he felt that Gillian knew what she was talking about and he bore it without flinching.
As they went along the muddy cinder path to the kennels Gillian was able to inspect him more closely. He was tall, clean-shaven, and younger than she had thought at first. Not a bad-looking man, she decided, if it had not been for his clothes. He was wearing a thin tweed suit of the loudest check imaginable, a light-coloured background patterned with lines of orange, blue, and brown. As if that were not enough he had chosen a tie and socks whose pale blue matched and accentuated the blue line in the suit, and there was a horrible hand-kerchief, orange—as far as she could see—with a blue border, poking out of his breast pocket.
Really, thought Gillian, it would be an act of charity to make friends with the man and tease or cajole him into modifying those dreadful clothes, which did not suit him in any way. With that colourless, rather solemn face and the high forehead from which his hair was already receding, he could not afford to be so flamboyant. He was like a caricature of an English country gentleman. Probably, she decided intelligently, he dressed like that only because he or his tailor thought that was how one ought to dress in the country.
She was quite right. Mr. Greenley, whose town clothes were as conventional as those of any other man, had depended too much on his mental picture of an English country gentleman when choosing tweeds for his country suits. But since he was so rich no one had questioned his choice, and if he noticed the difference between himself and the other men he met in the country he probably attributed it to their greater poverty.
It did not take long to select a puppy, and Gillian had no difficulty in selling the one Miss Selbourne wanted to get rid of. She almost felt she was taking an unfair advantage of Mr. Greenley, who readily accepted her suggestion that it was the prettiest and the liveliest, and did not notice that it was slightly undershot. But when she told him that it would be fifteen guineas his expression hardened. Mr. Greenley’s business instincts were very highly developed, and it was not in his nature to accept a price without bargaining.
“A lot of money for a little dog,” he said shortly.
At this Gillian’s compunctions vanished. She forgot that he knew nothing about dogs. She remembered that he was a rich man who could well afford fifteen guineas.
“It’s worth all of that,” she answered firmly, in a good imitation of Miss Selbourne’s voice. “In fact it may be worth a good deal more. You must remember that these are pedigree dogs. They are all registered at the Kennel Club. I don’t suppose that matters much to you,” she added, with a frank smile which recalled their earlier agreement on the subject of dogs, “but it does explain why they cost fifteen guineas.”
Mr. Greenley was a little shaken by the smile, but he rallied.
“I don’t suppose it will matter much to my niece,” he objected. “She’s only eleven.”
“Of course she might be just as happy with a mongrel pup,” Gillian agreed. “But then she’ll take it about with her and show it to everyone, and people who know about dogs will realize that you’ve given her a handsome present.”
She could not have found a more convincing argument. Mr. Greenley liked his presents to be thought handsome. He said cautiously, “Well, I still think it’s a lot of money,” but he said it in a tone that showed he intended to buy the puppy.
“Tm sure you won’t regret it.”
“Then I’ll have it.
Not,” he added hastily, “to take away with me.” He explained that his niece’s birthday was in three weeks time, and Gillian said that was a good thing as the puppy was still a bit young to leave its mother, and gladly undertook, on Miss Selbourne’s behalf, to have the puppy sent to Sunningdale and to write to Mr. Greenley’s sister so that she could arrange for it to be met. In all this she showed herself sensible and efficient. Miss Selbourne would have dithered and Miss Garrett would have agreed to anything and forgotten such important details as the date and the address. It was fortunate for them that Mr. Greenley had come on the afternoon of the dog show.
It was fortunate for Gillian, too. If she had met him in any other way Mr. Greenley would have pigeonholed her as “young woman living in the country,” and she would have been a type, not an individual. But now he had noticed two things about her. She did not care for dogs. She could drive a bargain. For he shrewdly suspected that the puppy was not worth the fifteen guineas she had unblinkingly demanded. Added to these, she was, as he had seen from the beginning, a very pretty and amusing young woman.
Gillian took him into the house to write the cheque. She had not spent the morning idly. The living-room was tidier than it had been for months, and all the muddy footmarks, human and canine, had been wiped off the floors. Gillian disliked what she called “squalor,” and felt that she could not appear at her best in a room where the mantelpiece was thick with dust and the flowers had died three weeks ago but still hung drooping in slimy vases. She had also cleared a sheaf of bills and letters off the writing-table and had even unearthed a fairly clean piece of blotting paper. Naturally, Mr. Greenley did not notice these changes, but he felt he was with someone who was alert and intelligent, intelligent enough, that is, to please him, for he did not desire a high degree of intelligence in women.
While he was writing the cheque Gillian slipped into the kitchen and put the kettle on. At her casual offer of tea Mr. Greenley opened his mouth to say that he was a busy man. But the absurdity of his being busy on a Saturday afternoon in the country struck him more forcibly than it had done on other occasions. He accepted, and was again pleasantly surprised when she produced the tea quickly, without fuss and without the apologies to which he had become accustomed on the rare days when he took tea in other people’s houses; for it seemed as if he had an unfortunate knack of being there when there was no cake, or a stale one, or on the day when the baker did not call.
Gillian gave him tea and gingerbreads. She did not explain to him that there was no bread and butter because the bread was hopelessly dry and she had used the margarine to make the gingerbreads. Instead she talked cheerfully and amusingly, telling him a little about the importance of the dog show and a little about herself and where she lived.
Presently Mr. Greenley was doing the talking. He told her about his niece and his nephews and his difficulty in remembering their birthdays and his sister’s annoyance when he overlooked these important dates. His sister lived only for her children and could not understand that a busy man like himself had other things to think about. He told her about his sister’s house at Sunningdale, which was very comfortable and yet not quite what it should be considering what it cost to keep up. Perhaps her servants were a lazy lot. The garden, said Mr. Greenley, frowning, was a disgrace.
“The gardener’s an obstinate old idiot. I often tell her she ought to get rid of him. Of course, he won’t take orders from a woman, that’s the real trouble. My sister,” he explained, “is a widow.”
“So am I,” said Gillian, looking sympathetic but amused. “And I feel for her. Gardeners can be terrible tyrants when they know you don’t know, or even if they think you don’t know. We haven’t a gardener at Woodside, only an odd man sometimes to do digging, but even he always wants to dig what we don’t want dug.”
He asked who looked after the garden when the odd man was not digging, and Gillian explained that her mother was gardener-in-chief and she and her sister junior, very subordinate gardeners.
“If you care for gardening,” said Mr. Greenley, “perhaps you would like to come over to Cleeve some day and have a look at mine. Of course, it may not interest you. I am”—his voice became a little pompous—“a specialist. Alpines and orchids are my greatest interest, and I flatter myself I am rather successful with them at Cleeve.”
“I should love to see them,” Gillian replied seriously. “But you mustn’t think I’m an expert gardener. You would have to explain everything to me.”
She looked at him hopefully, trustfully, and he found himself saying that it would give him great pleasure to show her round. After that he said it was time for him to be moving, and she did not try to delay him, but walked down to the gate at his side and made him laugh by describing how she had come to the rescue of Miss Selbourne and Miss Garrett. She confessed that she had expected he would be a man who would talk about dogs for hours, and in return he told her that he had resigned himself to the thought of listening—though not for hours—to some fool of a woman who hadn’t an idea in her head beyond dogs. Each of them felt complimented by the evident fact that they were superior to these fictitious characters.
At the gate he shook her by the hand and said he would ring up next time he was at Cleeve.
“I’m afraid you can’t. We haven’t got a telephone. Or a car,” she added regretfully.
Mr. Greenley was slightly disconcerted, which caused him to say impulsively: “Good Lord, what a life! How do you manage?”
He immediately regretted it. Experience had taught him that it was better to ignore other people’s poverty. If their attention was drawn to it they were apt to take offence, or worse still, to become plaintively sorry for themselves.
But Gillian simply laughed. It was not the heroic laugh of one who puts a brave face on things. It was a pretty laugh, bubbling and infectious.
“You look so surprised, as if I’d said we hadn’t got any sheets or blankets on the beds. It’s horrid of me to laugh, for really it just shows you must have a very kind heart. But we manage perfectly well. We’ve got bicycles.”
“Bicycles,” he murmured.
“Lovely bicycles—mine is quite new. You’ll see it when I come over to Cleeve. But you’ll have to send a postcard when you want me to come.”
“You can’t come that distance on a bicycle.”
“Indeed I can. I often go to Bramworthy, and it’s no farther than that.”
“Nonsense,” he said decisively. “I’ll drive over to fetch you. How about next week?” Mixed with the surprise of finding he had a kind heart was the surprise of finding that he really wanted her to come. She had made him laugh. She was a sensible young woman, having his own views about dogs. And she did not make a fuss about being poor, nor did she try to insinuate that there was no virtue in being rich. Instead, she said gaily:
“Of course, that would be lovely, much better than cycling, though I hope you haven’t suggested it just because you feel you ought to. Do you suffer from a sense of duty?”
“No,” he answered. It was true, but it was a thing he usually kept to himself, feeling, and perhaps rightly, that for a man in his position a sense of duty was a useful attribute.
“Neither do I,” said Gillian. “And now I’m sure you want to be off, and I must go and feed those bitches again.”
He reminded her that they had not yet settled upon a day for her to come over to Cleeve Manor. He suggested next Saturday; Gillian said it would have to be Sunday. Sunday then, at three o’clock.
She watched the car out of sight. The car had a wide, opulent behind, better suited to park gates and sweeping drives than to the narrow, dusty lane. She looked at her watch and was gratified to discover that it was nearly half-past six. She thought of Miss Selbourne and Miss Garrett, of Laura and Toby and all the other people at the show, and she decided that the impulse which had led to her spending the day at Bank Cottage had been a good impulse.
Upon this cheering thought she returned to the cottage, to wash up the tea
things and put the living-room back the way its owners had it, which meant collecting the letters and bills, the cushions with their feathers bursting out at the seams, the dog’s basket, and several old bones and rubber balls from the dark hole under the stairs where she had hidden them. Half an hour later, when she had begun to listen for Miss Selbourne’s return, she remembered that she had also hidden Agnes and Leo, after they had served their purpose as an introduction to Mr. Greenley. She had lured them into an empty compartment of the kennels, while Mr. Greenley was looking at the puppies. It was fortunate that there was just time to release Agnes and Leo before their loving owners returned, for to find their house pets callously relegated to the kennels might well have prejudiced such fanatics as Miss Selbourne and Miss Garrett. As it was, their arrival was curiously subdued, even the dogs barked less loudly, and Gillian quickly realized that they must have had an unsuccessful day.
It took her a little longer to realize that they were not on speaking terms.
“Was everything all right?” Miss Selbourne asked, when they got into the house; for their first duty had been to put the dogs to bed.
“Oh, yes.”
She gave them an account of the afternoon. The cheque was on the mantelpiece, with the address the puppy was to go to and the date it was to be sent off. Gillian picked up the cheque and handed it to Miss Garrett, who had thrown herself into an armchair by the fireplace in a manner that explained why all the chairsprings were broken. But Miss Garrett rejected it with a flapping motion of her hand. “I’m not the boss,” she said gruffly. So Gillian gave it to Miss Selbourne, who put it back on the mantelpiece.
She hardly liked to ask how they had got on at the show, for it was obvious that they had not got on well. She said it was time she was moving, remembering that this was Mr. Greenley’s formula for departure. But Miss Selbourne, though she might be tired, cross, and tearful, was still conscious that they were under an obligation to Gillian, and that the laws of hospitality applied even to people like herself who—as Tiger had recently told her—put their miserable little bank balances first and golden opportunities second. She offered Gillian a drink. Gillian thought it would be a good thing if they all had a drink, and as her acceptance would provide the occasion she accepted.
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