Civil to Strangers and Other Writings

by Barbara Pym

  Adam looked at Miss Gay over the top of his spectacles. He often wore them when people came to the house, to make himself seem more learned, but he could not see through them very well as they were intended only for reading.

  ‘Am I to understand that you have got as far as that?’

  Cassandra thought that he was getting rather silly and so, evidently, did the rector, for he joined the little group and asked Adam how he was getting on with his novel.

  ‘I have laid it aside,’ said Adam. ‘Temporarily,’ he added, imagining that he detected a look of disappointment on the rector’s face, although Cassandra, who had also been watching, suspected that it was relief.

  ‘Oh, but surely you will go on with it?’

  ‘Certainly, but in the autumn. I shall find it easier to write about the spring then. It is always better to recall one’s emotion in tranquillity.’

  Cassandra smiled, wondering whether, when autumn came, Adam would find that there hadn’t been any emotion to be recollected at all. She rather hoped so.

  ‘Then you are taking a well-earned rest?’ said the rector.

  ‘Oh, no.’ Adam shook his head and a weary smile crept over his face. ‘I am at present contemplating an epic poem,’ he declared, raising his voice a little so that, as he had intended, all the other people in the room heard, stopped their trivial conversations, and edged nearer to hear more about it. ‘Dryden tells us that it is the greatest work of which the soul of man is capable,’ he went on impressively.

  There was an admiring silence, during which nobody knew what to say. Then Mrs Gower remarked in an indulgent tone, as if she regarded him as a child who must be humoured, ‘My late husband once thought of writing an epic poem about King Arthur, but he never wrote more than fifty lines, as far as I can remember.’

  ‘And I suppose that wouldn’t be long enough for an epic?’ suggested Miss Gay, thinking distastefully of Paradise Lost.

  ‘Hardly,’ said the rector. ‘I imagine that length is an essential qualification, whatever else may be lacking.’

  The door opened and Lily announced Mr Stefan Tilos. The stage was set for an impressive entrance. All the occupants of the room were crowded in one corner where they had been listening to Adam, and when the door opened they all turned automatically to see who it was.

  Cassandra advanced to meet him. ‘I’m so glad you were able to come,’ she said.

  ‘It was most kind of you to ask me. But I am late, yes?’ He looked around him, smiling at everyone. ‘I am so sorry,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, not at all … ’

  Cassandra gave him some sherry and began introducing him to people. She tried to do this as quickly as possible, as she had the uncomfortable feeling that Miss Gay was watching her and was ready to snatch Mr Tilos away, should she monopolize him for too long.

  ‘Ah, my Parisian friend,’ he said, when he saw Miss Gay.

  Mr Gay looked at him sternly. How could this be? Angela had left Paris when she was a child.

  The rector cleared his throat. ‘I daresay you will find that it is quieter here than in your part of the world,’ he said.

  ‘I came here for quiet,’ said Mr Tilos, ‘and I hope I will find it.’

  Surely he isn’t writing an epic poem as well, thought Cassandra hopelessly. The town certainly could not hold two authors.

  ‘The country round here is very pleasant,’ ventured Mr Gay.

  ‘It is a healthy place, I think,’ said Mr Tilos.

  ‘Oh, no,’ interrupted Adam, ‘it isn’t. Not at all healthy,’ he declared gravely. ‘Too low lying.’

  ‘Perhaps he has come to lie low,’ said Miss Gay laughing. ‘After all, we know nothing of your past,’ she said provocatively looking up at Mr Tilos.

  ‘I must hope you will never discover anything,’ he replied in the same strain.

  I think we are going to regret this man’s presence among us, reflected Mrs Gower. He was far too handsome to be let loose in a small town.

  ‘Are you staying here long?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, yes, I hope that I stay many, many months.’

  ‘I expect you will find it tedious here,’ said Adam, ‘unless you like walking or riding.’

  ‘I like very much to hunt the wild boar,’ said Mr Tilos simply.

  Even Adam was impressed by this. He imagined mediaeval castles and spacious forests with great dogs running about. The rector remembered the ceremony of bringing in the Boar’s Head at Queen’s College, Oxford. Cassandra thought of one of those false boar’s heads, made of galantine with a shiny brown surface, decorating a cold buffet table. Nobody knew what to say. It seemed hardly kind to tell Mr Tilos that he was unlikely to be able to indulge in his favourite sport in Shropshire.

  He was standing by the fireplace with a happy smile on his face, almost as if he was smiling at some secret. This was, in fact, the case, and he could not very well reveal what it was. Being a susceptible man, he had fallen in love, at first sight, with Cassandra Marsh-Gibbon.

  CHAPTER TEN

  ‘An elegant sufficiency, content,

  Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books … ’

  ‘I don’t like it,’ said Mr Gay, shaking his head, and rubbing the aspidistra leaf vigorously. ‘No good can come of it.’

  Mrs Gower nodded sympathetically. ‘I’m sure you’re quite right,’ she declared. It was what she was used to saying after many years of life married to a man who was always talking about things slightly above her head. The late Professor Gower had thus had the gratification of knowing that his wife at least was convinced of his rightness when he maintained that Nicholas of Guildford had nothing whatever to do with The Owl and the Nightingale.

  ‘It was bad enough when Angela was after young Paladin,’ continued Mr Gay, ‘but of course every woman goes for a curate.’ He said these last words sadly, as if remembering the rich young women of the late Victorian period who had preferred the church to him. ‘I wondered if you could perhaps say something to her,’ he suggested tentatively. ‘You see, Angela has never had a mother … ’

  Mrs Gower looked rather alarmed. She did not by any means feel equal to being a mother to a thirty-year-old spinster who was determined to get herself a husband. Yet Mr Gay had been so kind, coming all this way on a hot afternoon to attend to the aspidistra, that she hardly liked to refuse point-blank. ‘Of course, you are her guardian,’ she said, stating an obvious truth to gain time.

  ‘Yes,’ said Mr Gay unhappily, for he was in no danger of forgetting. He had already been told by his niece that he had one foot in the grave, and the memory still rankled. In a burst of confidence he told Mrs Gower about it.

  ‘What a cruel thing to say!’ she protested indignantly. ‘But you shouldn’t let it distress you. Anyone can see that both your feet are a long way from the grave yet. You remind me so much of Professor Gower,’ she said suddenly.

  Mr Gay was aware that this was a compliment of the very highest order, for which any acknowledgement would be hopelessly inadequate, so he did not say anything. Mrs Gower, who read novels, would have described the silence as a pregnant one, but it brought forth nothing beyond the observation from Mr Gay that Angela was no chicken, which made it all the more awkward saying anything to her.

  ‘Why don’t you just let things take their course?’ said Mrs Gower wisely, although she was really trying to change the subject. ‘After all, a woman of thirty should be able to look after herself.’

  ‘Do you think so?’ For a moment the expression of Mr Gay’s face implied that he doubted whether a woman of any age could look after herself, but this expression was replaced almost immediately by one of mingled gratitude and relief. After all, what could he do? And things always took their course whatever one did, he told himself. He straightened and surveyed the aspidistra. It had become almost sprightly.

  ‘It’s quite rejuvenated,’ said Mrs Gower. She found her thoughts going back to the house in Oxford. She was ashamed to remember that she had not visited for several da
ys the room which she had filled with her husband’s belongings. I’ll take Mr Gay to see it, she thought suddenly. He was so sympathetic and understanding, although Mrs Gower was not clear what exactly there was for him to be sympathetic and understanding about, except the death of poor Ernest eight years ago, and she had just been coming to the conclusion that she no longer regretted that. ‘Would you like to see some of my late husband’s books?’ she asked. ‘I think you’d be interested in them.’

  Mr Gay’s face lighted up with pleasure. It was so seldom that anyone took the trouble to show him anything.

  They went upstairs, Mrs Gower leading the way. The room was on the first floor, and faced out on to the rose garden at the back of the house. Mrs Gower opened the door, and stood waiting for Mr Gay to go in.

  ‘Why, it’s one of the nicest rooms in the house!’ he exclaimed, unable to keep a note of surprise out of his voice. It was almost as if he were thinking what a pity it was.

  ‘Why yes, perhaps it is,’ said Mrs Gower slowly, as if this had not occurred to her before.

  ‘It must face south,’ conjectured Mr Gay.

  ‘Yes, it gets a great deal of sun.’

  They went to the window and looked out.

  ‘What a pleasant, peaceful view,’ said Mr Gay. ‘A lovely prospect. “Fields on this side, on that a neighbouring wood”,’ he recited a little sadly, for from the windows of Alameda one saw only tombstones, or the dusty monkey-puzzle in the front garden.

  Mrs Gower agreed with him about the loveliness of the prospect, although she had no quotation ready. ‘I hope they won’t build,’ she observed sensibly.

  Mr Gay looked about him. It was a nice room. Two of its walls and the spaces on either side of the door were taken up with bookshelves. There was a table in the middle of the room, and the large airy windows opened on to a balcony. In front of the window there was a desk, and in the corner to the right of it stood a large cage with a red cloth over it.

  ‘Of course I see that it’s dusted,’ Mrs Gower remarked confidentially. ‘There is such a thing as carrying reverence for the past too far, I think.’

  Mr Gay looked puzzled. Surely the late Professor Gower had never lived in this house, or indeed in Shropshire at all?

  Mrs Gower must have been reading his thoughts, for she remarked that her late husband had never really occupied this room, as he had died in Oxford, ‘But I have always kept his things here, and somehow it saves the trouble of explaining to people who don’t know about it. Perhaps it’s silly of me.’

  Mr Gay felt rather awkward. He turned away and began to examine the cage in the corner.

  Mrs Gower went over to it and drew off the cloth.

  In the cage was a parrot with bright green and grey feathers.

  It made no sound at being disturbed since it had been silent for the last seven years.

  Here Mr Gay really forgot himself. He laughed out loud. The bird looked so ridiculous perched there with its silly, staring, glassy eyes. But what a terrible thing he had done! He must surely have offended Mrs Gower for life. He saw himself banished from her pleasant tea parties. What could he say or do to make amends?

  ‘Why, Mr Gay,’ she said, ‘it does me good to hear laughter in this room. I never thought of it before, but I suppose it is funny to see poor Wulfstan stuffed,’ she added, almost apologetically. ‘Professor Gower was so fond of him. He tried to teach him Old English, but he never got beyond saying Hwaet! How he used to startle us with it sometimes!’ Mrs Gower was laughing now. ‘Poor Wulfstan, he was such a lively parrot. I wonder if I could give him away,’ she mused. ‘Perhaps the rector knows of some child who would like him.’

  ‘I believe one of the rector’s boys collects birds’ eggs,’ said Mr Gay helpfully.

  ‘But of course poor Wulfstan is rather past the egg stage,’ laughed Mrs Gower. In fact she laughed more than was necessary, for she was enjoying the sensation of being able to make fun of hitherto sacred relics. With Mr Gay there didn’t seem to be anything wrong in it at all; she almost imagined that poor Ernest was there too, laughing with them. ‘Anyway,’ she went on, when they had both laughed at her little joke, ‘I’m sure the rector would know of somebody. And there are far too many books in this room. I wonder whether the public library would like some of them?’

  ‘I’m sure it would be only too glad of them,’ said Mr Gay enviously.

  ‘But of course some of them are too good for the public library. Are there any you would like?’ Mrs Gower looked vaguely about her at the ancient calf-bound volumes.

  ‘Oh, but Mrs Gower, I really couldn’t … ’

  ‘Well, anyway you must come and help me sort them out one of these days. I know so little about books, and I’ve only kept these out of sentiment. I don’t like the old ones – I’ve never been able to get used to their horrid smell.’

  As they went downstairs Mr Gay could not help wondering whether it was not perhaps wrong of them to begin disposing of the late Professor Gower’s possessions like this. He felt vaguely responsible, although he could not have said in what way. He felt that he ought to say something, and yet it wasn’t any business of his what Mrs Gower chose to do, although if he hadn’t laughed about the stuffed parrot it might not have occurred to her. He was standing on the doorstep puzzling about this when his attention was distracted by something across the road. Mrs Gower, who had been pointing out her flame-coloured lupins, stopped in the middle of a sentence, and they both stood still in the middle of the path and stared.

  Mr Tilos was walking down the drive of Holmwood, carrying the largest bunch of Madonna lilies that either of them had ever seen. As he came nearer they looked at each other questioningly. Could it be that they were imagining things? For it seemed to them that Mr Tilos was singing.

  They both felt rather embarrassed as he drew near. They did not know what to say and were relieved when he took no notice of them. He seemed so happy and engrossed in smelling the lilies that he did not even see them, but walked quickly down the road, almost tripping in his haste.

  ‘Well, well,’ said Mrs Gower, ‘I wonder what lucky person is going to have those beautiful lilies.’

  ‘I expect they are for the church,’ said Mr Gay sensibly.

  Mrs Gower looked disappointed at this simple explanation. ‘I suppose they may be,’ she admitted reluctantly, ‘but I can’t help feeling he may be taking them for your niece.’

  ‘Oh dear, I hope not. I don’t know where Angela would put all those flowers. Besides, it would make things even worse,’ he added unhappily. He had not wanted to be reminded about Angela, and now this wretched foreigner with his lilies had quite spoilt the afternoon.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  ‘At first the groves are scarcely seen to stir

  Their trembling tops …’

  Mr Tilos would have been most concerned if he had known that he was spoiling anyone’s afternoon. He had been so happy when he gathered the lilies from the conservatory, and when he walked down the drive and into the road, he had burst into song almost without knowing it.

  He was surprised at the amount of attention he seemed to attract as he walked through the town. People even turned round to stare at him, for he was already being pointed out as the new tenant of Holmwood and a foreigner. His only fear was that the lilies might droop or their juicy white petals become bruised before he reached his destination. He had to walk a long way, but he felt that it was more suitable to arrive on foot, carrying his offering, than to drive up to the door in his car.

  This must be the house; he remembered the stone gateposts and the long avenue of poplars. He marched boldly up the drive and then, not wishing to ring the bell if he could help it, he walked cautiously round to one side of the house. Here he stopped, for he heard sounds coming from an open window on the ground floor. Somebody was reciting poetry. Mr Tilos caught a fragment:

  ‘And this those other eyes of mine had seen

  That still a boundless … ’

  but the rest was los
t to him as the reciter, who was pacing about the room, had walked over towards the door. Mr Tilos wondered for a moment what ‘other eyes’ were and what it was they had seen. That must be the husband, he thought. He felt he must look again to make sure, but just as he was going to press his face as near to the glass as he dared, he was startled by the sound of crunching gravel behind him.

  He turned round suddenly, and saw Cassandra standing on the path with a small fork in one hand and a basket of weeds in the other. She had been standing there for some time, rooted to the spot by the sight of Mr Tilos with a huge bunch of lilies in his arms, looking through Adam’s study window.

  Mr Tilos had not intended their meeting to be like this. The look of consternation on his face when he saw Cassandra standing there was so pathetic that she smiled kindly as he walked towards her.

  ‘I have brought you some flowers,’ he said simply.

  ‘Oh, how lovely they are!’ exclaimed Cassandra. ‘But surely you can’t mean them for me?’

  ‘Beautiful flowers for a beautiful woman,’ said Mr Tilos bowing, although with some difficulty as the flowers were in his way.

  Cassandra received the compliment as gracefully as she could, for she had never felt less beautiful in her life. She knew without looking at herself that her face was shining and unpowdered, her hair untidy, and her hands and nails caked with earth. Her old blue gardening skirt and jumper concealed rather than set off her nicely rounded figure, while her sensible-sized feet looked even more so in their inelegant galoshes.