Civil to Strangers and Other Writings

by Barbara Pym

  Sadly, John Lehmann, editor of Penguin New Writing ,did not care for the story: ‘September 19th. Did a little writing and washed my hair. Had ‘Goodbye Balkan Capital’ back.’

  ‘Across a Crowded Room ’ was commissioned by the New Yorker and published in July 1979. Barbara was very gratified to be asked to write for a magazine of international standing and felt that this really confirmed her ‘rediscovery’ as a writer.

  As for the subject of her story – in April 1978 she had written to Philip Larkin

  You say that you will be in Oxford 19th–20th April – is that by any chance for the Rawlinson dinner at St John’s? Because if it is we may catch a glimpse of each other (across a ‘crowded room’, of course), as I have been invited to this as a guest … I thought I had better warn you, though in a novel one would prefer the man to be taken by surprise and even dismayed!

  So, Some Tempestuous Morn

  A wet morning, thought Anthea sadly, listening to the rain which did not seem to go with the brilliant bird chorus. A wet morning in North Oxford, with its laburnums and flowering shrubs and strange architecture and her great-aunt’s gloomy, solidly furnished house … If she had opened her eyes for a moment, Anthea closed them again; she was not quite ready to face life yet. People did not always realize that even at nineteen one sometimes had to make an effort.

  Anthea was a pretty, gentle-looking girl and her parents were abroad. ‘My nephew has a very high position in the Colonial Service and is doing brilliantly … ’ – how often had she heard Aunt Maude make that remark to the dull people who came to the house. Anthea herself was vaguely ‘studying English Literature’. She was not clever enough to go to one of the women’s colleges, but there seemed no harm in her going to a few lectures chosen by her aunt or in her meeting the carefully selected young men, so ‘suitable’ and usually so uninteresting, who were invited to the Sunday afternoon tea parties. Perhaps their grandmothers had known Aunt Maude as a girl, or there was some ecclesiastical connection – Canon Bogle’s son, Archdeacon Troup’s nephew, or even some distant link with a bishop or titled person. All were carefully chosen and existed because of their impeccable connections rather than in their own right.

  Anthea had never had a young man of her own; sometimes she admired particular undergraduates from a distance, but they never seemed to notice her and they never turned out to be the kind her aunt would ask to tea on Sundays. These might dart frightened glances in her direction through the forests of tables and china ornaments, but Anthea, in her perverseness, felt that she would only despise them more if they appeared to be attracted to her. It was the unattainable ones she pined for –

  The desire of the moth for the star,

  Of the night for the morrow,

  The devotion to something afar

  From the sphere of our sorrow …

  She did not perhaps appreciate what a comfort English Literature was to her in her lonely state. She saw herself, three months from her twentieth birthday, growing to be like Miss Morrow, her aunt’s companion, dim and not very well dressed; the kind of person who had no life of her own and who, in an hour or two, would be tapping at her door to tell her it was time to get up.

  Waking at dawn, Miss Morrow heard the rain drumming on the laurels below her window, and no doubt dripping through the branches of the monkey-puzzle too, she thought, imagining it there in the half-light, coming too close to the window.

  ‘This is a front bedroom,’ Miss Doggett had so often reminded her. ‘It is really one of the best rooms in the house. Not many companions would be given such a room. I happen to know that Lady Victoria Nollard’s companion sleeps in an attic on the same floor as the servants.’

  ‘She is lucky to have servants as well as a companion,’ Miss Morrow had said, making one of those unfortunate rejoinders which were so unexpected from one of her meek appearance.

  ‘Lady Victoria Nollard is an Earl’s daughter,’ had been Miss Doggett’s simple but magnificent reply.

  After five years Miss Morrow had grown used to the room and even liked it. She lay now, listening to the rain, looking at her ‘things’, those objects that make one room a home, without really noticing them. She was so familiar with the faded photographs of her parents – the inevitable clergyman and dim-looking Edwardian lady – the school group, the little souvenirs from a holiday on the Italian Riviera or in the Highlands of Scotland, the prize set of Jane Austen’s novels, and the Penguins with their orange covers looking a little garish next to the leather-bound poems of Matthew Arnold.

  Matthew Arnold, ah yes, he would be able to describe this morning … Miss Morrow raised herself up on one elbow, imagining the drenched garden at the back of the house.

  So, some tempestuous morn in early June,

  When the year’s primal burst of bloom is o’er,

  Before the roses and the longest day –

  When garden-walks and all the grassy floor

  With blossoms red and white of fallen May

  And chestnut flowers are strewn …

  All that heavy rain in the night would have spoilt the flowers she was to pick for decorating the church this morning. She felt almost glad and lay smiling in bed, thinking of the vicar’s wife in her silly raffia-embroidered hat and listening to the rain falling among the leaves. So, some tempestuous morn, indeed!

  In an hour it was time to get up. Miss Morrow went to the window and, with a daring gesture, flung aside the net curtain that screened her doings from prying eyes. Opposite, through the dark spiky branches of the monkey-puzzle, it was possible to catch a glimpse of the theological college with its architectural extravagances, coloured brickwork, pointed Gothic windows and little towers. And inside – Miss Morrow’s vivid imagination went rushing boldly in – were the theological students in their narrow cell-like rooms, all behaving in a devout and suitable manner. Or indeed, it is to be hoped that they are behaving in such a manner, she said to herself. There was certainly no sign of life now, but after a moment or two a figure on a bicycle appeared in the road and dismounted at the gate of the college. It was a strikingly handsome clergyman, not very young, but certainly not old, perhaps about Miss Morrow’s own age which was the late thirties and really quite the prime for a man, though it could be many things for a woman and not all of them quite the prime.

  As he stopped to open the gate and push his bicycle in, something must have made him turn and glance at the house opposite and upwards at the figure of Miss Morrow in the window.

  Going to have breakfast with the principal, she thought. A hearty manly breakfast of mutton chops and beer … no, hardly that, manly Oxford breakfasts were not what they were and perhaps men were not either. Tea and cornflakes, more likely …

  The rain had stopped now and the sun was shining brightly. A sudden impulse made Miss Morrow wave her hand at the clergyman. He raised his hat in reply and smiled; then he was gone through the gate, wheeling his bicycle round the side to the little Gothic bicycle-shed.

  Miss Morrow laughed to herself and turned away from the window. Whatever could she have been thinking of to wave to him like that? Still, no doubt he had thought it was ‘one of the servants’ and in any case he was probably accustomed to gestures of this kind as a rightful tribute to his good looks. She must hurry down now and help Maggie with the breakfast and call Anthea on the way.

  Breakfast was already on the table when Anthea came down. Miss Doggett was pouring out the coffee, the sun was shining and through the french windows the lawn and the drenched herbaceous border could be seen.

  ‘Well, Miss Morrow, I’m afraid the flowers are quite spoilt,’ said Miss Doggett, almost with satisfaction. ‘You will find it difficult to pick anything for the decorating. The peonies are all beaten down by the rain.’

  ‘Yes, ravaged, aren’t they?’ Miss Morrow glanced indifferently towards the window. ‘Ravaged, ravished, one might almost say.’

  ‘Ravished?’ repeated Miss Doggett, her voice puzzled as if there was something not qu
ite right about the word, though she was unable to say exactly what.

  ‘Ravished, yes,’ repeated Miss Morrow firmly.

  Anthea giggled.

  ‘Really, Miss Morrow. I hardly think … ’ Miss Doggett’s tone was pained but she did not want to have to put what she felt into words. Indeed, she hardly knew how to. The unsuitability … and Miss Morrow often had these little lapses. Quite well bred, Archdeacon Troup had given a reference, most glowing, really. It wasn’t that she was unsatisfactory, exactly; there was nothing one could put one’s finger on. It was these remarks she let fall, these unsuitabilities. Were they perhaps clues to what went on in her thoughts, her mind? Miss Doggett pursed her lips and fingered one of the gold chains which hung on the bosom of her purple dress.

  ‘Anthea, you are late this morning.’ Her tone was sharp. It was a relief to turn from the darkness of her companion’s mind to her niece’s unpunctuality. ‘And what are you going to do this morning? I expect they will want some help with the decorating, you might go along with Miss Morrow. I shall want some cakes from Boffin’s, too. Quite a number of people will be coming to tea tomorrow.’ She smiled, unable to stop herself at the thought of the Honourable Basil Fordyce, a Peer’s son and bishop’s nephew, taking tea in her drawing room. She had invited this particular young man on several previous occasions, but his charming replies had always put her off, regretting so much that he had another engagement, nothing would have delighted him more than to take tea with Miss Doggett. And tomorrow, feeling perhaps that he might as well get it over, he was really coming. She did hope that he and Anthea would take to each other, for, to give Miss Doggett her due, she was as anxious as her niece that love should enter her life, though, of course, she would not have put it quite like that. Anthea would marry, naturally, but it must be a suitable marriage. There had already been one or two disappointments, not only in Anthea’s failure to impress the young men, but in the young men themselves. Canon Bogle’s son had turned out to be a grubby young man in corduroy trousers; Lady Dancy’s nephew was too small and apparently interested in nothing but archaeology. That had been a great disappointment; even Miss Doggett could see that there was little future in dry bones and fragments of pottery.

  Miss Doggett rose from the table.

  ‘Man goeth forth to his work and to his labour, until the evening,’ thought Miss Morrow, going up to help Maggie with the beds. She supposed she would have to go into the garden and pick some flowers for the church and then stand by while the vicar’s wife arranged them more tastelessly than one would have thought possible.

  ‘I will go for the cakes, Aunt Maude,’ said Anthea. It was a lovely morning now and she could take a long time over her errand and perhaps walk somewhere by the river, away from the depressing presence of her aunt and her companion. Perhaps it would be better to buy the cakes afterwards; she would not want to carry them into Christchurch meadows.

  It was a pity she had not yet reached Matthew Arnold in her studies of English Literature for she would have found much in his poetry to enhance her enjoyment of the beautiful morning and the Oxford scene, but as it was she wandered by the river in a pleasant state of melancholy, wondering if she would have a romantic encounter this morning.

  She had been walking for some time before she came upon him, the young man reclining in a punt with a book which he did not appear to be reading. He was anchored round a bend in the river, half hidden by the drooping branches of a willow, so that she came upon him suddenly and was so startled that she stopped involuntarily, for he was – and this seemed right and inevitable on such a morning – one of those she had admired from afar at Professor Lyly’s lectures. She must have looked surprised, perhaps she even exclaimed, for he looked up as she approached and smiled.

  ‘An encounter,’ he said. ‘What could be more suitable on a June morning, Penelope?’

  ‘My name isn’t Penelope,’ she said stupidly. ‘And you don’t know me anyway, so how could you know my name?’

  ‘But I do know you – sitting in a corner at old Lyly’s lectures taking down every platitude that falls from his lips and never raising your eyes from your notebook.’

  ‘I don’t remember seeing you there,’ she lied, but their glance had never met. ‘And what’s the use of going to lectures if you don’t take notes?’ He never did, she had seen him just sitting, looking bored and sometimes drawing on a sheet of paper.

  ‘Of course you are not an undergraduette,’ he pronounced the word distastefully, ‘so it may be that you take the study of English Literature seriously. I imagine you living in some Gothic house in North Oxford, a fastness with horrid towers and dark trees, so much more inaccessible than a women’s college and so much more intriguing.’

  She smiled faintly. He was making fun of her, she knew, but how was she expected to respond? She had certainly not imagined their first meeting like this. ‘I do live in North Oxford,’ she ventured, ‘and in a house rather like that, I suppose.’

  ‘Why don’t you come and sit down and tell me about it?’ He held out his hand and she stepped on to the green velvet cushions in the bottom of the punt.

  Once there she felt stupid and awkward. Whatever would Aunt Maude say? Why, this young man had just ‘picked her up’; she could imagine her aunt’s tone and pursed lips as she pronounced the words; it was most unsuitable.

  ‘Tell me about your Gothic house,’ he said. ‘Do you live with your parents?’

  ‘No, my parents are abroad. I live with my great-aunt.’

  ‘Does she have Sunday afternoon tea parties?’

  ‘Why, yes. How did you know?’

  ‘All respectable North Oxford residents do. I have made a study of their habits. I really think I shall have to do some practical field-work and get myself invited to one.’

  ‘Oh, dear,’ Anthea stood up suddenly. ‘I’ve got to buy cakes for tomorrow – I’d quite forgotten.’

  ‘Surely the guests won’t notice what they eat if you are there?’

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t say things like that. You’re only making fun of me.’

  ‘My dear, I assure you I’m not,’ he said, really looking quite serious. ‘What is the name or number of your great-aunt’s house?’

  ‘It’s called Leamington Lodge. There’s a monkey-puzzle in the front garden. It’s opposite a theological college.’

  ‘Perhaps we shall meet again,’ he said gaily. ‘You never know.’ And taking her hand he kissed it lightly. ‘Now run and buy your cakes.’

  Anthea hurried away in a turmoil of emotion. It was only when she had got into Boffin’s and noticed that the best cakes were gone that she realized that she did not know his name nor he hers and that he had made no serious suggestion about meeting her again. For a moment she felt a little cast down, but she cheered herself up by remembering the lectures. Now perhaps they could smile at each other and speak. He might even sit by her. She did not know how she was going to get through the days until the next lecture. Oh, she thought, carelessly choosing a dozen of any old cakes, it was fine to be young and in love on a lovely June morning – not like poor Miss Morrow, grey and in her thirties and decorating the church with the vicar’s wife and all the other good ladies who were so patronizing to her.

  The peonies, the ravished peonies, thought Miss Morrow, padding about among the wet plants in her galoshes. When she touched one all the petals fell off, but there were other flowers that would do quite well. She cut some syringa and irises. Purple, that was a Lenten colour, not really right for Whitsuntide. Still, they were lucky to get anything.

  She hurried to the church and into the porch. The mumbling of women’s voices with one or two raised in command told her that she was late. The sun was shining brilliantly now and the church seemed all the darker by contrast. The vicar’s wife had her back turned as Miss Morrow entered and nobody noticed her come in. On a sudden impulse she laid the flowers down in a corner with the others already there, and tiptoed away. She did not feel like decorating this morning,
handing bits of greenery to the vicar’s wife up in the pulpit or filling jam jars with water.

  She felt very free when she got outside the church – a whole hour of her own, what should she do with it? Morning coffee first, that sinful habit denounced by Miss Doggett as time-wasting and self-indulgent. ‘When one has had a good breakfast and is going to have a good luncheon it is quite unnecessary to eat or drink between meals.’ Where should she go to waste time and be self-indulgent? Obviously not to one of the places where she might meet one of Miss Doggett’s less strong-minded friends. She would go to the fashionable undergraduate haunt of the moment, the café of a large shop, where up to now she had only peered from the cake department into the smoke-laden and vice-infested air. She found a table on the outside edge of the room where she could observe and remain inconspicuous, a dim figure on the fringe of the University melting away into North Oxford, she felt. It was quite alarming the decadence there must be among our youth today, she thought with amusement, noticing how full the tables were. Time-wasting and self-indulgent … still, perhaps they had not all had good breakfasts or could not be so sure of adequate luncheons. Well, it was not really so very interesting, she decided, as she drank her coffee and ate a large sickly cake, and the coffee was not so good as that made by Miss Latimer and Miss Forge, two gentlewomen who ran a dull teashop frequented by Miss Doggett’s circle. Still, it was something to have been here, an experience. There would be time to walk through the shop before she need return to Leamington Lodge.

  It was here that she really came to grief, fingering a rail of printed summer dresses in gay colours and patterns. Perhaps it was her contact with decadence that made her linger and pick out a dress patterned with green leaves. The girl who helped her to try it on was so kind and encouraging. She said it suited her and it was such a nice day after all that rain early this morning, it really made you feel like buying a new dress.