Company in the Evening

by Ursula Orange

  * * * * *

  There followed a time I prefer not to recall in detail. Antonia—although very far from being recovered by Monday—was not by any means dangerously ill. Some of the time she hardly seemed ill at all, but her ear obstinately refused entirely to clear up, her temperature continued to go up at nights, and she was, of course, confined to bed. It was, I learnt, what one nowadays calls an ‘otitis media’—the modern version of the old-fashioned earache, and Dr. Lambert called every day, not, she assured me cheerily, because there was anything she could do, but because ears were “funny things” and must be watched because there was always the possibility of mastoid which was, she need hardly tell me, a “nasty thing.” Dr. Lambert paid me the compliment of treating me as a sensible mother who would not panic. I did not—outwardly. But inwardly the word ‘mastoid’ gave me the jitters, and really I would much rather she had taken me a little less into her confidence. I had always supposed that mothers naturally worried over their children when they were ill, but I had never realized that I should find it practically impossible ever for a moment to think about anything else. I told myself feebly that if it had been anything but ‘ears,’ I should have been more sensible. I told myself that it was my good luck with Antonia hitherto, my sheer lack of practice, that caused me to worry so much. I told myself that I was suffering a good deal more than Antonia. All these things were, I think, true. But none of them helped much.

  Sunday night was the worst. Antonia had hardly eaten anything all day, and her temperature rose to 104 degrees. I felt perfectly certain that she was in for mastoid, particularly when I discovered, to my horror, that she was quite deaf in the affected ear.

  I decided, then and there, that wild horses would not drag me to the office the next day. It was not that I did not trust Blakey to do all for her that I could do, which was very little. It was just that I felt that I simply could not face being separated from her for close on twelve hours, and missing Dr. Lambert’s promised visit at that. Blakey, to her credit, understood this perfectly, and took no sort of umbrage. She was, during all this time, the staunchest and loyalist of supporters. On Sunday night, at my request, she went and telephoned Mrs. Hitchcock at her house, to say I would not be at the office the next day.

  I did not funk telephoning Mrs. Hitchcock myself. I was really past all that. It was merely that I was busy making Antonia’s bed for the night and wanted to act instantly on my decision. Blakey came back after a few minutes to say Mrs. Hitchcock wanted to know if I could come on Tuesday instead.

  “Tell her I’ll let her know later,” I said impatiently. “Oh no—wait a minute. No, Tuesday I definitely can’t. Say I’ll certainly be in on Wednesday.”

  On Wednesday I certainly must be. It was the day of my lunch with Dorothy Harper. Tuesday was the day the widow was coming to see me and Antonia. It was hardly a propitious moment to have chosen, I thought distractedly, but I did not dare put her off now. I might lose her altogether if I did, and to feel I ought to start advertising and casting about again at this precise moment would be the last straw, I thought.

  Blakey retired with this curt message, and I finished reading a footling story about rabbits to Antonia, as I had promised. Even with a temperature of 104 degrees she appeared to take her usual interest in literature.

  She was, poor darling, touchingly ‘good’ all this time. A sick child is, of course, a spiritless child, and dealing with her was pathetically easy. Later I was to find that a convalescent child is a peevish child, a very different matter altogether.

  “That Mrs. Hitchcock seems to think she’s somebody, doesn’t she?” remarked Blakey when I came downstairs.

  “Oh well, she is, after all,” I said vaguely, and then, suddenly seeing the point of Blakey’s comment, “Why? Was she annoyed about me not coming in on Monday?”

  “She seemed to think she had a right to know just why you couldn’t,” said Blakey with a touch of indignation.

  “Oh well, Blakey, she has. She’s my employer, after all.”

  Blakey sniffed. I am in her eyes above all things ‘a lady.’ It is slightly infra dig. for me to be at the same time someone else’s employee.

  “I hope you told her the reason, Blakey?”

  “Oh yes, I told her. Now don’t you worry about that office of yours, Miss Vicky. If that Mrs. Hitchcock can’t carry on for a day or two without you, what’s she there for?”

  I smiled at this slightly twisted logic. Nevertheless there was something very comforting about Blakey. I liked the look of her white apron, of her not very prepossessing but utterly familiar face, of her gnarled working-woman’s hands. Above all, I liked the feeling that she was staunchly ‘on my side,’ willing to identify her life with mine in a way that domestic servants (very rightly, no doubt) never do nowadays. I would miss her terribly. I did not doubt but that she would miss me either.

  “Blakey, you remember, this woman’s coming on Tuesday? I’m sorry Antonia’s in bed, but you’ll help me all you can to show her everything, won’t you?”

  “Oh yes, Miss Vicky. I only hope she’s a decent body.”

  A decent body! From what I could judge of her letters, Mrs. Dabchick (for such was her peculiar name) was not setting up to be anything quite so satisfactorily humble as that.

  * * * * *

  Sunday night was, as I have said, the worst. On Monday, morning Antonia’s ear was discharging again, and after that it mercifully began to clear up. On Monday night her temperature was normal, and on Tuesday morning she was hungry for her breakfast. Dr. Lambert, who called early on Tuesday, seemed to think convalescence would now be rapid and straightforward.

  I was, of course, enormously relieved, and more than a little cross with myself for having endured such unnecessary agonies. I also was suddenly aware of feeling extremely tired.

  Antonia, on the other hand, suddenly got bored with bed and bored with being good. Peevishness was now obviously going to be her line until she was allowed to get up again. Once again I felt slightly at a loss to know at what point one resumed normal disciplinary action.

  The situation was complicated by the fact that, although I had prepared her for “someone coming to see her” on the Tuesday, I had not explained who this person was, or might be. She did not yet know Blakey was going. I had thought it preferable not to tell her until the date was settled. I passionately wanted Antonia to be at her best before Mrs. Dabchick, but could see no way of stage-managing the interview to ensure this. It would have been so much simpler had Antonia been about, coming and going, in the normal way.

  Mrs. Dabchick arrived while Antonia was having her mid-morning rest. Her appearance I can only describe as, like her letters, a trifle on the gushing side. Scarves were wreathed round her neck, a swagger coat floated in folds behind her, trimmings bobbed on her hat. A spate of conversation poured from her lips, interspersed with high-pitched laughter. She certainly bore no resemblance to the grim-faced Gorgon I was anxious to avoid at all costs for Antonia, but even less resemblance possibly to Blakey’s ‘decent body.’

  I was prepared to be very ‘friendly’ to her and explain frankly my circumstances. For a long time I did not have a chance. She was exquisitely friendly to me instead, and told me all about herself.

  She was, I was given to understand, a lady, a lady financially badly placed, but oh! so brave and sensible about it all. All her friends said to her, my dear, they said, you can’t go out and work in somebody else’s house, but what did she answer? She just answered that of course she could, why ever not? For years she had done everything—yes, everything—in her own house so, why not in someone else’s, she would like to know?

  She paused expectantly, as if awaiting a flood of protestation from me, but really I hardly thought it was my place to join the ranks of her friends, indignant on her behalf. I merely nodded and asked if she had not then worked as a Nanny before her marriage, as I had been given to understand?

  Mrs. Dabchick laughed a little shamefacedly and said coyly t
hat she would let me into a little secret. This post had sounded so much the sort of thing she was looking for—being a sort of second Mummy to a little girl whose own Mummy couldn’t be much at home—that perhaps she had pretended a little bit in order to get at least an interview. She hadn’t actually been a real Nanny ever—when her father was alive he wouldn’t have heard of such a thing—but she had always been crazy about children and had often and often looked after her little nephews and nieces when they were tiny. It was the greatest grief to her that, when she was married, she never had any little ones of her own. Now please I mustn’t be cross with her for this tiny deception, which she had meant to explain frankly to me the moment she saw me. It was just that she had liked the sound of my letters to her so much that she felt that this—yes this! (flinging an arm expansively out)—was just the place for her.

  I did not, by any means, share her conviction. However, I said cautiously that Antonia was nearly five and hardly needed a trained Nanny now in any case.

  “And that darling baby I caught a glimpse of as I came in, peeping at me out of his pram? That’s your sister-in-law’s little boy, you mentioned in your letter, is it?”

  “Yes, that’s Philip.”

  “What a pet!”

  “Yes. Er—you do understand, Mrs. Dabchick, don’t you, that you wouldn’t be in charge of him? Mrs. Sylvester looks after him.”

  “Oh, of course I understand! You put it all so plainly—and so nicely!—in your letter. He’s got his Mummy all the time, so of course I shouldn’t dream of interfering. You won’t think I’m blowing my own trumpet, will you, Mrs. Heron, if I say I’ve always been considered rather a tactful person? I absolutely understand that it’s your little girl who’s my business.”

  “And the cooking,” I said, a little baldly. This picture of a more or less motherless and forlorn Antonia annoyed me. “I’m only at the office three days a week, Mrs. Dabchick, although of course I work at home the other days. I like to take over Antonia quite a bit when I’m home. Blakey and I always worked it out between us quite well—although I must admit Blakey was marvellous in doing all the cooking and housework. I wouldn’t expect—anybody else—to do quite so much.” (As a matter of fact, I had. But a sudden vision of Mrs. Dabchick scrubbing the floor, scarves, hat and all, upset me with its obvious incongruity.) “I’m quite prepared to get a charwoman. There is, after all, more to do now Mrs. Sylvester’s living with me—although I know Mrs. Sylvester wants to help now too . . .” I stopped. I seemed to be making the whole situation out more of a muddle than it really was. “I’m afraid we’re a rather peculiarly constituted household,” I finished up with an apologetic smile.

  “But that’s what’s so delightful!” exclaimed Mrs, Dabchick gaily. “That’s just what attracted me when I read your letter! Like you, I hate formality and conventionality. Let’s all share the work together in a friendly way, that’s what I say!”

  With such smiles and enthusiasm did the woman speak, that I was almost hypnotized into agreement. I had, quite sternly, to dismiss from my mind this pretty picture of us all picking up pails and mops and dancing and singing about the room—to remind myself brutally that, on the contrary, I did like a certain modicum of formality and conventionality, and that, even more brutally, I was proposing to pay Mrs. Dabchick to do the work, not to share it.

  “Would you like to see Antonia now?” I said, thinking it better on the whole to change the subject for the present. “I’m awfully sorry she has to be in bed to-day, as I explained just now.”

  “Poor little mite! Is she a wee bit delicate perhaps?”

  “Not a scrap. She’s never been ill before in her life,” I retorted, a little squashingly perhaps, but the woman couldn’t have it all her own way. “Come up with me, won’t you?” Antonia had had a really good night, and had not now, I felt sure, gone to sleep. It was time to rouse her for lunch and I thought it a good moment to introduce them. Antonia was always pleased to be told she could stop resting.

  As we went up the stairs together I heard a slight scuffle from behind Antonia’s door. When I went in she was in bed, but I could not help noticing that a teddy-bear, which I remembered lying unclothed on the floor when I left her, was now wearing trousers and sitting on the windowsill.

  This was, of course, definitely Naughty, by any nursery code, and at any other time I should have been severe about it. It was only Mrs. Dabchick’s presence that made me decide quickly to be unobservant and not notice.

  “Well, darling!” exclaimed Mrs. Dabchick. “Do you know, I believe you and I are going to be great friends!”

  “Why?” said Antonia, not unreasonably, I thought.

  I had warned Mrs. Dabchick that Antonia did not know that Blakey was going. It was a silly opening in the circumstances. I waited with some amusement to see what the woman would find to say next.

  As a matter of fact, she did not behave nearly as foolishly as I had expected. She turned the conversation instantly to Antonia’s toys, many of which were piled rather untidily about the room, and Antonia responded rather well. Half-pleased, half-annoyed (for downstairs I had practically made up my mind that she was hopeless and that I didn’t care anyway how the two got on together), I faded into the background. When Mrs. Dabchick picked up Teddy and admired his trousers, Antonia sent a slanting mischievous glance in my direction, which I pretended not to see. The ringing of the luncheon-gong disturbed quite a merry little chat, between them.

  “What a darling!” said Mrs. Dabchick, as we went downstairs.

  I could not help my heart warming to her slightly.

  “She liked you,” I said generously. (I always feel I am conferring a medal on someone when I say this.)

  “She liked my scarves and my hat, didn’t she?” said Mrs. Dabchick happily. “Children always like pretty gay things, don’t they?”

  I agreed. The fact that I personally found Mrs. Dabchick’s clothes both foolish and unsuitable probably merely convicted me of snobbishness.

  We went in to lunch. The spate of conversation continued—with this difference: that Rene was now present, and made a much more sympathetic and nicer listener than myself. Indeed, Rene and Mrs. Dabchick got on so well together that, over the pudding, they practically had a nice cry together about Mrs. Dabchick’s unborn children. She had hoped and hoped, she told us—and once it really had seemed as if her dreams were going to come true after all . . . but alas! no.

  “Oh, I am so sorry,” cried Rene impulsively, her eyes big with sympathy. “What hard luck on you when you love children so!”

  Mrs. Dabchick registered gallant resignation.

  “Ah well! These things just happen to some unlucky people. Please don’t think I grudge anybody else their children, even the tiniest bit. If I can be of some help to someone else who has been luckier than myself, that’s all I ask now.”

  I really thought Rene was going to forget herself and impulsively promise Mrs. Dabchick a home here immediately. Hastily I suggested we should have coffee in the sitting-room. We moved and resettled ourselves. The flow of conversation poured on. I sat a little apart, feeling aloof and beastly.

  I could not help deeply distrusting this damned up vicarious motherhood. I felt Mrs. Dabchick would be only too ready to let it sweep over Antonia like a torrent, and I had an uneasy feeling that Antonia might possibly respond rather too well and get mentally softened and cosseted just when it was important for her to become more independent. Also, quite apart from this question, I wanted someone who really was a capable cook. I would have preferred a little less about the unborn children, and a little more interest in what the kitchen and scullery were like.

  As against this, it was not, I knew, going to be at all easy to find the utterly reliable sort of person I wanted. A very young girl was out of the question. An elderly trained Nanny would not be likely to want such a post. Mrs. Dabchick was, for all her foolishness, a vicar’s daughter. In some ways, at least, she would never let me down. That counted for something in t
hese difficult days.

  I hate indecision. It worries me in other people, but infuriates me in myself. In the end I excused myself for an hour before tea, on the plea of work, and put the whole question firmly out of my mind.

  I was, indeed, horribly behind with my office stuff.

  * * * * *

  “Well?” said Rene enthusiastically as the door finally closed on the last chatterings and flutterings.

  “I don’t know, Rene. I simply don’t know. You liked her, didn’t you?”

  “Oh yes, I thought she was awfully nice. So friendly and sweet.”

  “Friendly, certainly. Do you think she could really manage the cooking, Rene?”

  “Oh, surely between her and me we could, Vicky. That was what I really liked so much about her. She’d be such a nice person to work with, don’t you think?”

  “Personally I should want her to quieten down quite a bit first. All that talking would drive me crazy. However, that’s possibly more your look-out than mine, as you’d see more of her.”

  “I think she’s been lonely and just hasn’t had anyone to talk to for a long time. I felt so sorry for her. She told me all about her husband’s death after you’d gone, you know.”

  “I’m sure she did. That’s just it.”

  “What do you mean, Vicky?”

  “Well . . . Rene, don’t think me utterly cold-blooded and awful if I say it’s just that sort of thing that puts me off. I’m sorry for her too. I think all that about longing to come here so much and how she was going to be on tenterhooks until she heard from me was quite sincere.”

  “I thought it was awfully nice and genuine too.”

  “Yes—only unsuitable, Rene! That’s what I mean. Her whole manner was unsuitable. Now don’t misunderstand me—I don’t mean in the least that I wanted her to fold her hands and call me Madam. I only mean that when one’s applying for a job one shouldn’t talk about one’s dead husband and one’s unborn children. It’s off the point. It’s an unfair appeal for sympathy. I shouldn’t dream of going on like that myself if I wanted a job.”