by Barbara Pym
‘How upsetting for you,’ murmured Dulcie.
‘Well, it wasn’t really so very upsetting,’ said Miss Randall, her voice ringing out through the restaurant car. ‘It was only a cousin, and poor Basil and I never got on very well as children; but as one gets older one feels the pull of family ties, however distant. There was another cousin there, a clergyman who took the service, with his sister — I never liked them much either.’ She laughed heartily. ‘But we all got together over the funeral baked meats. You know, a glass or two of really good sherry works wonders on these occasions. Oh — and whom do you think I saw at Paddington when I was waiting for the train?’
Dulcie somehow guessed who it would be, but did not say.
‘Dr Forbes! Aylwin Forbes, you know,’ Miss Randall brought out triumphantly. ‘I expect you remember him fainting at the lecture. “Some problems of an editor”.’ She chuckled reminiscently. ‘I’m afraid I deliberately avoided him. I wasn’t feeling in the mood for his kind of talk.’
What could be more delightful than Aylwin’s kind of talk, whatever the subject, Dulcie thought, dismayed at her immediate reaction to Miss Randall’s words. Was she then in love with him, or merely infatuated, like poor Miss Spicer with Neville?
‘We saw him at Taviscombe,’ said Viola. ‘As a matter of fact we were staying at his mother’s hotel.’
‘I believe she’s quite a “character”, as they say,’ said Miss Randall. ‘Married a son of the local gentry, who was disowned by his family. Quite a suitable background for A.F., one feels.’
‘Yes, it seems right that he should have an unusual background,’ said Dulcie. ‘He’s such a rare person.’
‘A rare person?’ echoed Miss Randall. ‘A rather good-looking man who has made a mess of his marriage, by all accounts — I shouldn’t have thought that was rare at all.’
Dulcie was silent, mainly because she did not know how to explain Aylwin’s rareness, but also because she was embarrassed by the penetrating quality of Miss Randall’s voice.
They began to talk of more ordinary things, and finally parted in the corridor.
‘No doubt we shall meet in London,’ Miss Randall boomed. ‘Perhaps at the B.M. or the Public Record Office, if we can get past the queues waiting with their magnifying glasses to examine the Casement diaries,’ she chuckled.
‘What a relief it will be not to have to do that dreary sort of work,’ said Viola.
‘I thought you liked helping Aylwin with his index,’ said Dulcie reproachfully. ‘But if you’re going to marry Bill Sedge …’ she went on, doubt colouring her tone.
‘Marriage isn’t necessarily the answer to all one’s problems,’ said Viola evasively, from which Dulcie concluded that he had not yet proposed to her.
‘No, one sees that it isn’t always the answer,’ she agreed. ‘But women like to settle down, mostly. Affairs and liaisons get to be rather dreary for ordinary people approaching middle age. Of course there are exceptions,’ she added hastily. ‘If one were the mistress of some great man, perhaps…’
‘You mean a poet or a king or a politician?’ said Viola sardonically.
‘Well, poets seem not to be great nowadays in the same way that they used to be,’ said Dulcie vaguely, ‘and there are so few kings left. As for politicians, with the Welfare State one feels that even the home life of our Conservative leaders is above reproach. So perhaps it isn’t so easy nowadays … I wonder if Miss Lord will have thought of getting anything in for supper? I expect she will have been giving the house a good clean this morning.’
Miss Lord was waiting for them in the hall when the taxi drew up at the door.
‘East or West, Home is Best,’ she announced cheerfully. ‘Well, Miss Mainwaring, you don’t look as if the sea air had done you much good, but Miss Dace has got quite a colour. And these flowers came for you, Miss Dace.’ She thrust a Cellophane-wrapped sheaf of carnations into Viola’s arms. ‘The short dark gentleman brought them — he said you’d know whom they were from.’
Viola took the flowers and hurried upstairs with them. Dulcie wondered if she minded Miss Lord describing her future husband as ‘the short dark gentleman’. Then it occurred to her that perhaps she would not. When one loved somebody, everything about him — imperfections, vices even — became rare and special.
‘Bill wants me to have dinner with him,’ said Viola, coming down with a note in her hand.
‘Oh, but you’ll be too tired after the train journey,’ Dulcie exclaimed without thinking.
Viola gave her a pitying look. ‘I don’t find a train journey all that exhausting,’ she said. ‘I must go up and change.’
‘Miss Dace will be dining out?’ said Miss Lord rather grandly.
‘Yes. I hope you hadn’t gone to too much trouble to get something for us,’ said Dulcie, immediately feeling guilty.
‘Oh, not really,’ said Miss Lord, in the off-hand tone that in many people is a sure indication of umbrage having been taken, ‘but I did think you’d both be ready for something after your long journey, so I did take just a little trouble to have things nice. But there you are,’ she added with a little laugh, ‘we never know what’s going to happen, do we.’
‘But Miss Lord, I shall be here, and I’m certainly ready for your delicious supper,’ said Dulcie, wondering if Miss Lord would have taken so much trouble if she had been alone. ‘I’m hungry enough to eat for two.’
‘I don’t know about delicious,’ said Miss Lord, slightly mollified. ‘It’s fillets of plaice in a mushroom sauce.’
‘It certainly sounds delicious.’
‘You see, the sauce is really that concentrated soup — you just pour it on,’ Miss Lord explained. ‘I saw it on TV.’
‘How fascinating.’ So she had not spent hours making a roux and carefully blending in various subtle ingredients, Dulcie thought. That was certainly a relief. ‘Miss Dace will be sorry to have missed it, but she had this sudden invitation to go out to dinner.’
‘With that short dark gentleman,’ declared Miss Lord flatly.
‘Yes, with Mr Sedge.’
‘Jewish, isn’t he?’
‘I don’t know. I suppose he may be — partly, at any rate. He came from Vienna before the war.’
‘I suppose he’ll eat with his hat on,’ said Miss Lord. ‘That’s what they do, Miss Mainwaring. I’ve seen them in the kosher restaurant near where I live — eating with their hats on. A little skull cap doesn’t look so bad, quite distinguished, really, but a black trilby’s another thing. I wonder how Miss Dace’ll like that.’
Dulcie sat down at the kitchen table, exhausted.
‘And wearing their hats in church, too,’ Miss Lord continued. ‘In the synagogue, that is.’
‘Yes, I believe they do. Isn’t that Miss Dace going out now? I should like my supper quite soon, please, Miss Lord.’
‘And a glass of sherry, too, Miss Mainwaring. That’s what I’m going to get you. You look quite washed out.’
‘Thank you,’ said Dulcie ironically, letting Miss Lord bustle round her. ‘And won’t you have one yourself? You must be needing one as much as I do.’
‘Well, I wouldn’t say need, Miss Mainwaring, but it’s one of those little extra luxuries that it’s nice to have sometimes.’
Please don’t tell me that you can’t afford it, said Dulcie to herself; but when Miss Lord came back with two glasses of sherry she was on the subject of Dulcie again.
‘It’s you that ought to be going out,’ she said, ‘being wined and dined, as they say. Oh, Miss Mainwaring, I can’t think what went wrong between you and Mr Clive. I didn’t like to say too much at the time, but he was such a nice young gentleman. It was a great blow to me when the engagement was broken off, I can tell you.’
‘Oh, these things happen,’ said Dulcie casually. ‘I suppose we weren’t really suited to each other, and it’s better to find out before it’s too late.’
‘Yes, a broken marriage would be a dreadful thing,’ said Miss Lord in a
hushed tone. ‘But I did hope, that evening in the winter when he came to dinner, that perhaps it might be all on again.’
‘No, there’s no chance of that ever happening,’ said Dulcie, wishing Miss Lord would go.
‘I wonder why men do these things,’ said Miss Lord, peering intently at Dulcie. ‘If I may say so, Miss Mainwaring, you’d make a very good wife. Of course,’ she went on quickly, ‘you’re not glamorous.’
‘No,’said Dulcie.
‘Do you think —‘ Miss Lord began hesitantly. ‘Oh, Miss Mainwaring, you won’t mind if I speak frankly?’
‘Of course not,’ said Dulcie, wondering what could be coming. Some hint about personal ‘daintiness’, doubly embarrassing from a social inferior? She nerved herself to face the worst, but when it did come it wasn’t really so bad — just something she had always known about herself.
‘You could make so much more of yourself, Miss Mainwaring,’ said Miss Lord almost on a despairing note, ‘if only you would.’
‘What should I do?’ Dulcie smiled.
‘Well, you could have your hair restyled by one of those Italian hairdressers — in the bouffant style, they call it — it would add fullness to your face, make your head look bigger.’
‘Do I want my head to look bigger?’ Dulcie fingered her fine, smooth hair. ‘Would it be an advantage? Anyway, I don’t think my hair would go like that.’
‘You could have a perm — to give it body,’ said Miss Lord eagerly. ‘They use rollers to set it, you know. And you could use more eye make-up. It would make your eyes look bigger.’
Dulcie laughed. ‘Goodness! Head bigger and eyes bigger — then what?’
‘Then you’d be the one to get the bunches of carnations,’ said Miss Lord triumphantly. ‘Well, I must be getting you your supper. You didn’t mind me talking like this, did you? But oh, Miss Mainwaring, I should so like to see you get married.’
‘I think getting married depends on more than that,’ said Dulcie. ‘It comes from within, an attitude of mind, somehow.’
‘Yes, but a man’s got to notice you, hasn’t he — that’s the first step.’
‘Yes, I know.’ Men have noticed me, in a sense, thought Dulcie, remembering Maurice and Aylwin and Neville Forbes, but nothing has come of it. Miss Lord meant ‘notice’ in a different way, obviously.
‘You read too much, that’s your trouble,’ said Miss Lord, seeing Dulcie settling down at the table with a book. ‘They don’t like it.’
‘No, I don’t think they do,’ said Dulcie, but absently now, as the world of the book began to seem the real one.
When she had finished eating, she sat reading for a while longer, then washed up, unpacked her suitcase, and prepared to have a bath and go to bed. She brushed her hair out and tried to make it look ‘bouffant’, and decided, peering into the glass, that perhaps her eyes were rather on the small side. She was still sitting at her dressing-table, but thinking now about the richness of Aylwin’s background in Taviscombe, when she heard Viola’s key in the front door.
‘Dulcie!’ she called. ‘Do come down!’
‘But I’m going to bed, or nearly,’ Dulcie called back. ‘I’m in my dressing-gown.’
‘Oh, don’t bother about that,’ said Viola impatiently. ‘Bill and I have some news for you.’
They’re engaged, Dulcie thought, disliking herself for the slight sinking feeling she experienced. And it will be all jolly, and I shan’t really know what to say, especially in my dressing-gown.
‘Good evening,’ she said rather formally to Bill Sedge, who was standing in the drawing-room with Viola. ‘Do excuse me for appearing like this — ‘ ‘appearing’ was the word, she felt — ‘but you know how it is,’ she concluded lamely, for how could he know?
‘You look charming,’ said Bill Sedge. ‘Only an Englishwoman can really wear blue,’ he added, making it seem to Dulcie a doubtful compliment from a Viennese. ‘Nylon, isn’t it?’ he said knowledgeably.
‘Yes, you’re supposed to be able to wash it, though as it’s quilted, I rather wonder …’
‘But you can, I assure you. These nylon housecoats have been one of our most successful lines.’
‘Ah, yes, I suppose you would know these things,’ said Dulcie, a little embarrassed.
‘Oh, Bill, tell her our news,’ broke in Viola impatiently.
‘Yes, do — but I think I can guess,’ said Dulcie, whipping herself into eagerness.
‘Viola has done me the honour of accepting me as her husband,’ said Bill Sedge, bowing towards his fiancee.
‘Oh, how lovely! I’m so glad. I’m sure you’ll both be very happy. This calls for a celebration, doesn’t it. We must have a drink,’ said Dulcie. But what? she thought helplessly. She herself, having had her bath and being ready for bed, had been looking forward to a cup of Ovaltine, but that was out of the question now. Was there enough sherry for three, she wondered, trying to remember the look of the decanter.
‘If you will allow me…’ Bill Sedge had, characteristically, produced an interesting-looking bottle, apparently from nowhere. ‘I have brought a bottle with me. I thought you might not have champagne,’ he added apologetically.
‘You might not have champagne’! Dulcie laughed to herself. How right he had been! But did many women living on their own keep a bottle or two of champagne in the house? There might be some who did, rare creatures, hardly of this world.
‘I’ll get some glasses,’ said Viola.
Really, she looks almost beautiful, thought Dulcie, with her rather gaunt features softened by love. And the whole thing is so incongruous, unsuitable, almost. If we hadn’t gone to Neville Forbes’s church that evening, we shouldn’t have seen Bill Sedge arranging the knitwear in the window…
The sight of a foaming champagne bottle can produce laughter and gaiety even in a suburban drawing-room, perhaps there more than anywhere.
‘And next it will be your turn, Miss Mainwaring,’ said Bill Sedge, gallantly raising his glass to her. ‘Romance is in the air. Even in West Hampstead,’ he added, surprisingly.
‘West Hampstead?’ Dulcie echoed. ‘Yes, I suppose there as much as anywhere else.’
‘It is fine news about your auntie — one likes to see an older lady getting married — that is good,’ he declared.
‘You mean Aunt Hermione? Getting married?’ said Dulcie in amazement. ‘But who?’
‘That I don’t know — the name of the fortunate man.’
‘I don’t know about fortunate,’ said Dulcie.
‘But surely! Any man is fortunate to marry the woman of his choice. Miss Mainwaring, your glass is empty — that will never do!’
Dulcie allowed her glass to be refilled.On this surprising evening, even the idea of anyone marrying Aunt Hermione seemed not too incongruous. But who was the fortunate man?
Chapter Twenty-Four
ALTHOUGH it was now early summer there was little change in the house as Dulcie approached it. The variegated laurels did not alter with the time of year, and neither Bertram nor Hermione had thought to mark the season with suitable plants as their neighbours had done. Even Dulcie’s entrance reminded her of the visit she had paid before Christmas, for her Aunt Hermione, as then, came to the door in her hat and apologized for being in the middle of a telephone call.
This time her loud clear tones were addressed to the London Electricity Board, and the conversation seemed to be about power plugs and something called a ‘ring circuit’, which Dulcie found rather mystifying.
Bertram was sitting in the drawing-room, playing with a Corinthian bagatelle board. The metallic clash of the little balls absorbed all his attention, so that he hardly looked up when Dulcie came in.
‘Six fifty!’ he called out. ‘That’s pretty good for Hermione and the Vicar, don’t you think? I’ve just played a game for each of us — I only got three hundred and ten for myself, but I can do much better than that. I’m going to the Abbey, you know, at Corpus Christi. Much, better to start off in the summer, I
felt.’
‘And Aunt Hermione is to marry the Vicar?’ asked Dulcie, a little bewildered. ‘The one whose sister died?’
‘Yes — he has turned to Hermione at last, or rather she has indicated the direction he should take. I suppose women always do that, really,’ said Bertram. ‘Now, Dulcie, my dear, shall I play a game for you?’
‘If you like,’ said Dulcie, humouring him.
‘Bertram, do put that ridiculous toy away,’ said Hermione, coming into the room. ‘You won’t be able to have it at the Abbey, you know.’
‘All the more reason for playing with it now — and I must do one for Dulcie.’
‘Congratulations, Aunt Hermione,’ said Dulcie, kissing her on the cheek. ‘This is wonderful news — and what a pretty ring you’re wearing.’
‘Thank you, dear. Yes, I insisted on an engagement ring,’ said Hermione, stretching out her hand the better to display the gold ring set with three diamonds. ‘People will gossip, you know, and I’ve been doing so much popping in and out of the vicarage lately. Would you believe it, there was no power there at all — not a single power point in any of the rooms! I was shocked, I can tell you. Now —‘ she took off her hat and prepared to settle down — ‘Mrs Sedge will have tea ready in a minute.’
‘Oh, dear…’ The last little silver ball rolled into place. ‘Only a hundred and five for you, Dulcie. I don’t think I’ve ever made such a low score as that,’ said Bertram smugly. ‘Still, it’s only a game, you know. You mustn’t be upset by the low score.’
Dulcie smiled. ‘I’ll try not to be. And what’s going to happen to Mrs Sedge?’
‘She has been lucky enough to find a very good post,’ said Hermione, ‘which will suit her very well, I think.’
‘Yes, and I like to think that I was largely responsible for that,’ said Bertram. ‘She is to be cook at the house of the Principal of the Teachers’ Training College, where I used to be.’
‘It should be just the thing for her,’ said Dulcie.
‘She will have a comfortable bed-sitting-room — with television of course,’ said Hermione.