Barney rose, followed by the innocent looking young man. The mark of Lotus’s teeth was plain on Barney’s cheek.
“How nice of you to be so punctual.” It was as if nothing had happened; almost as if nothing had happened ever. Barney’s tone was the pink of polite nothingness.
“We’ve walked,” remarked Peggy. “From the other side of the Edgware Road.” Griselda did not really understand Peggy. Possibly she profited from being brought out.
“How sensible of you to bring your rucksack.”
“I like to keep my hands free.”
“Naturally.” Barney turned to Griselda. “Do introduce your friend.”
“Peggy Potter. Barney Lazarus.”
“The painter?”
“Himself. How do you do?”
“I know your work.”
Barney was admiring Peggy’s large bust.
“Better than knowing me.”
“Stop fishing for compliments, Barney. She’s only just set eyes on you.” The girl on the step above was speaking. “I’m Lena Drelincourt.”
“How do you do?” said Griselda. “I’m Griselda de Reptonville.”
“Not patient Griselda?” cried the innocent looking young man in a public school voice and high glee.
“This is Freddy Fisher,” said Barney, embarrassed because he had failed to introduce Griselda.
“I write,” explained Lena Drelincourt.
“I work in a bookshop. Perhaps we stock you.”
“I shouldn’t think so.”
“There are several more of us to come,” said Barney, making conversation. “Guillaume and Florence. Your friend Geoffrey Kynaston. And, of course, Monica Paget-Barlow. And Lotus.”
“And Lotus,” said Lena Drelincourt, underlining.
“More women than men, I’m glad to say,” resumed Barney.
“Twice as many,” said Lena, “not counting Freddy, which you can’t. It’s an incitement to unnatural vice.”
Freddy Fisher blushed all over his head and neck.
“So many of the younger generation of men like to stay in bed over the week-end,” explained Barney.
“Where’s Geoffrey?” asked Lena. “If he doesn’t appear soon, I’m going to take charge.”
“Why are the arrangements always left to Geoffrey?” asked Freddy Fisher.
“Because he makes a scene otherwise,” answered Lena.
“He’s not a child.”
“No. He’s a baby. He only feels grown up when other people do what he says.”
A tired looking girl, obviously much younger than she seemed, with a small round head and a small round face, nondescript hair and nondescript clothes, came out of the house. Barney introduced her as Monica Paget-Barlow. She smiled quickly, said nothing, seated herself on the top step and began to knit.
She was immediately followed by Guillaume and Florence. Guillaume was an elderly-looking man (though he also was probably younger than he looked), with long sparse grey hair and an air of unsuccessfully applied learning. His other name was announced as Cook. He was exceedingly untidy.
Florence was a slender dark woman of about thirty with short brown hair and a Grecian nose. She gave an impression of quietness and docility, which, like her appearance, was far from unattractive. She wore a tight shirt of dark-blue jersey-silk, which emphasised her slenderness and lack of figure, and dark blue trousers. Consciously or otherwise, the costume was well chosen to present her to advantage. She was introduced as Florence Cook, but probably was not. Griselda liked her at sight, and wondered what she found in Guillaume, supposing that she found anything.
“We could hardly have a better day,” said Guillaume in accents of deep anxiety. Before long Griselda perceived that it was his habitual tone. He spoke seldom and slowly and, though his words were commonplace, he appeared to worry very much over choosing them. Now he continued to stare at the sky, already almost colourless with heat.
“Have you all got your lunches?” enquired Barney.
Everyone had. Monica Paget-Barlow’s was contained in a round bundle, somewhat resembling a pantomime Christmas Pudding.
“I could put some of the packets in my rucksack,” suggested Peggy, who, though Griselda had sat on the step, still stood on the pavement.
“Splendid,” said Lena. “Many thanks.” She extended her packet.
“I don’t think you should do that,” said Freddy Fisher to Peggy. “Or let me carry the rucksack.”
“I’m used to walking with a rucksack.”
Florence was restraining Guillaume from offering their joint packet.
“There’s Geoffrey,” cried Freddy Fisher.
They watched him approach. He was entirely unencumbered. His dancer’s gait was exhilarating.
“Hullo Griselda. Hullo everybody. Anyone got any lunch to spare?”
No one spoke.
“I expect there’ll be things left over when the time comes. Where’s Lotus?”
“Lotus!” shouted Lena Drelincourt without moving and at the top of her very clear voice.
There was an expectant pause. But nothing happened.
“Go and get her,” said Lena.
Without either intending it, Barney and Kynaston looked at one another for half a second.
“Shall I go?” asked Freddy Fisher helpfully.
“You go,” said Barney and Kynaston, each to the other; and Freddy Fisher went.
The expectancy became a strain.
“Where are we going?” enquired Florence.
“Epping Forest. Walk to the Dominion, Number Seven bus to Liverpool Street, train to Chingford,” replied Kynaston. “There are Day Tickets.”
“Tell us about the Forest,” said Florence.
“There are parrots.”
“Anything else?” enquired Lena.
“Epstein at work,” said Barney.
“I know his work,” said Peggy.
Suddenly Lotus appeared, followed by Freddy. It was as when the Conductor goes to fetch the Prima Donna. Everyone, moreover, stood up.
Lotus wore a black shirt buttoned to the neck, and a white linen coat and skirt, expensive, fashionable, and likely to remain clean for one day only, or for less. Alone among the women she wore silk stockings, and her shoes had the air of being specially made for her. By daylight, Griselda thought her lovelier than ever. Standing in the doorway with the dark passage behind her, she surveyed the party with her bright green eyes, looking through Barney, and over Peggy, until she saw Kynaston slightly concealed behind Guillaume.
“Geoffrey,” she said, “let us lead the way together.”
She looked like “Harper’s Bazaar”, but she walked like Boadicea. In fact, she could probably outwalk all of them, except Griselda, and (if the walk were far enough off the map) Peggy Potter.
On the Number Seven bus, Lotus sat with Kynaston in an empty front seat; Peggy with Barney; Monica with Guillaume; Griselda with Florence; and Lena by herself, peeling a large pear with a larger clasp knife, which had been dangling from her belt. There was no seat for Freddy, who volunteered to stand inside; where, the others being all outside, he paid all the fares. Monica and Guillaume travelled in silence. At the bus stop Monica had brought her knitting from the discoloured circular reticule in which it travelled, and had resumed work, hardly ceasing even in order to climb the stairs of the vehicle. She was producing a small tightly knitted object, the colour of a brown-green lizard, more brown than green. Guillaume seemed lost in sad thoughts.
“He suffers a great deal,” said Florence to Griselda, regarding with apparent fondness the blotchy back of his scalp. Her voice was sweet and quiet.
“Why?” asked Griselda.
Lena stopped peeling for a moment and cocked a faun-like ear.
“He is a disappointed man.”
Lena resumed peeling.
“Why?”
“He is disappointed in the world. He is disappointed in himself.”
“Can nothing be done?”
/> “I do what I can. But I sometimes think he’s disappointed in me.”
“That’s absurd. I mean I’m sure he isn’t.”
“I am too small a thing really to enter into him.”
“How long have you been together?”
Lena had finished peeling and begun eating, cutting the soft ripe flesh into precise sectors.
“Twelve years. Since I was nineteen. He has been my life.”
“I know how you feel.”
Lena glanced at Griselda sharply. Florence gazed at her for a moment, then said: “These picnics! Why do we go on them?”
“I don’t really know,” said Griselda. “It’s my first.”
“I wonder how many of us really enjoy them . . . I mean really. You know what I mean by enjoyment?” She looked solemn, and a little timorous.
“Yes,” said Griselda. “I know what you mean by enjoyment.”
In the front seat, Lotus, early in the day though it was, laid her beautiful golden-red head gently on Kynaston’s shoulder; who squirmed slightly, then appeared to resign himself. The bus had only reached Holborn Viaduct. Barney and Peggy were talking about tactile values. Lena shut her big shining knife with a loud snap, and reattached the weapon to her person.
On the train they were unable to find a compartment to themselves and they had to pack in with a couple travelling from one side of London to the other, in order to spend the day with a married daughter. Even without Freddy, who was queueing for tickets, it was very congested on such a hot day. Monica’s knitting needles became entangled from time to time in the male stranger’s watch-chain.
“Yuman personality,” said the male stranger to the female stranger. “It’s sacred. You can’t get past that.”
“We’re all as we’re made,” said the female stranger.
“No system of Government will change yuman personality.”
“Either way it’s the same.”
“Yuman personality is sacred.”
“It bloody well isn’t,” interjected Barney. “You try being a nigger in the deep south.”
“Kindly refrain from using foul language in the presence of my wife,” said the male stranger.
“Behave yourself, Barney,” said Lotus. “Or you can go home.”
“No offence,” said the male stranger. “Not really.”
“I am offended,” said Lotus.
“I should think so too,” said the female stranger. “Dirty Yid!”
Barney, so easy and self-possessed before Lotus had joined them, flushed slightly, but said nothing. Peggy threw Griselda a glance of unsatisfactory anticipations fulfilled.
Freddy only managed to race up the torrid platform and hurl himself amongst them just as the train started. There seemed nowhere for him to sit but the floor; with which, however, he professed himself quite content.
The embarrassment, discomfort, and tension were little relieved by Lena producing a thin pocket book from one of the breast pockets of her shirt and commencing to make some small drawings.
“Anti-semitism is so unnecessary, don’t you think?” said Florence quietly to Griselda, as the train puffed up the incline to Bethnal Green. “I know it’s one of the things he feels particularly. Though he doesn’t say so, I know it.”
“Is he a Jew?”
“Oh no. He feels with all who suffer. The people everywhere.”
“Look at that,” said the male stranger, savagely indicating Bethnal Green. “Shocking.” He glowered accusation at the misjudged Barney.
“What does Lotus live on?” asked Griselda in an undertone.
“She’s an heiress.”
“Then what’s she doing in Juvenal Court? I’m sure you know what I mean.”
“She likes living with artists. Also she’s in love with Geoffrey and he’s not in love with her. It’s her way of ever seeing him.”
“Are you sure Geoffrey’s not in love with her?” It was difficult to believe that any man could resist Lotus’s beauty, passion, imperiousness, and riches. Moreover, she was holding Geoffrey’s hand at that very moment.
“Quite sure. You can tell because he refuses to let her keep him. That’s a sure sign with Geoffrey. Though he’s weak of course, he refuses to be kept by anyone he’s not in love with.”
“Have you known Geoffrey for long?”
“He lived in Juvenal Court for two years; when he was teaching the recorder you know.”
“Do you like him?”
“Everyone likes Geoffrey, He’s weak, but sweet.”
“Like that nauseating tea,” said Lena quietly.
“Florence,” said Guillaume across the compartment. “Look at the sunlight on the windows of that gasworks.”
“Yes, darling. Beautiful.”
“If only it could be made as sunny and glittering within.” He seemed more troubled than ever.
“People like you and me don’t know how the factory workers live,” observed the male stranger, disentangling Monica’s wool from the lower part of his braces.
“What the hell’s the good of going somewhere as lovely as Epping Forest,” soliloquized Lena in her clear voice, “without a man to ravish one?”
After that the strangers fell silent until the next station, at which they alighted.
At Chingford, under Kynaston’s direction, they struck up the road to the Royal Forest Hotel, then descended to Connaught Water. Kynaston and Lotus still walked ahead, their easy efficient movements a pleasure to watch. Had she not known them, Griselda might have taken them for gods descended to Essex earth. The rest of them advanced en masse, two of the number knowing the others hardly at all, the rest knowing them perhaps too well. Peggy was conserving her energy, as if a range of mountains would have to be crossed before nightfall. Lena slouched with her hands in her pockets; but her slouch was somehow electric.
“Do you see how the water catches the reflection of the willows?” said Guillaume to Florence.
“Yes, darling. Beautiful.”
Outside the Hotel were motor coach parties drinking. When they set eyes on Lotus, they whistled and catcalled because she was so beautiful: but Lotus strode past, like a Queen on her way to execution, not increasing her pace or diminishing her poise.
“Anyone know what that is?” asked Peggy, taking no notice and pointing to Queen Elizabeth’s Hunting Lodge.
“It’s one of the places where the upper classes get together to kill things,” said Guillaume.
“Damn good sport,” said Freddy Fisher. “Done any beagling?” he enquired of Griselda.
“No, never,” replied Griselda.
“I beagled almost every day for a month last autumn. You can if you’ve got a fast car.”
“What do you do with the rest of your time?”
“Learn to paint. Animals and birds, you know. I’ve got to for a living, more’s the pity. Dad’s lost his last halfpenny. Horses, you know.”
“But you’ve still got a fast car?”
“Not any more.”
“Oh dear.”
“You’re terribly pretty, Griselda. I should have liked to ask you home. Mum would have taken to you no end.”
“Perhaps I shall meet her sometime,” said Griselda politely.
“She’s dead. Drugs. Dad was to blame.”
“I am sorry. But I don’t know that you should be so sure it was your Father’s fault.”
“Of course it was Dad’s fault. He had to stop it all coming out at the inquest.”
“Still it’s often hard to be sure.”
“Of course I’m sure. It’s spoilt my whole life.”
“Can we stop for a moment?” asked Monica. “There’s a drawing-pin in my shoe.”
When Connaught Water came in sight, covered with boats, Florence’s sensitive face lighted up. “Oh I should like to go out in a boat.”
Guillaume’s brow became rigid with apprehension. “Hardly with so many other people, Florence. I am sure the boats must be dirty.”
Florence smiled gentl
y and said “It just passed through my mind, darling.” Married or not, Florence was suffering from that cancer of the will which Griselda had observed so often to accompany matrimony. She and Lena exchanged glances.
At the lake they left the road and entered the trees. Within five minutes the clatter had become inaudible. They passed several times from thicket to clearing, the change in temperature being each time overwhelming, and soon were among the hornbeams.
“Everyone,” cried Lotus over her shoulder, “must look for a parrot.”
Kynaston caught Griselda’s eye and looked deeply unhappy.
His distress of mind possibly accounted for the fact that within ten minutes from leaving the road, they were lost. Kynaston did not for some time admit this, but urged them on, with unnecessary expressions of confidence, along a rutty but diminishing track; they could make a right angle in any direction, but could not continue in their course.
“I wonder which of these would be the quicker?” soliloquized Kynaston. Clearly there should have been a path through the brambles which lay straight ahead.
“Don’t be silly,” said Lena, “they go in opposite directions. You’d better choose.”
“I wish we had a map among us.”
“We rely on you.”
Kynaston looked wildly from left to right and back again while they waited for him to decide.
Guillaume broke the long silence. “Both ways look equally beautiful,” he said helpfully.
“Does it matter?” cried Lotus. “Do we really have to get anywhere?”
Peggy’s expression changed from aloofness to horror.
“To travel is better than to arrive,” said Guillaume.
“To travel hopefully,” corrected Lena. “What hope have we?”
“Surely we should enjoy ourselves?” said Florence. “On such a lovely day?”
Monica had begun to knit. Freddy was brooding about his Father’s wickedness. Barney had been filling his heart with tears ever since the train.
“The thing is, Griselda,” said Kynaston desperately, “that I’m better at organizing picnics than walks.”
“I remember,” said Griselda, taking pity on him.
The Late Breakfasters and Other Strange Stories Page 20