Excellent Women

by Barbara Pym

  I thought they looked a little surprised at this, and then it suddenly dawned on me that perhaps they meant Roman Catholic, so I hurried to explain myself.

  ‘Oh, well, mistakes will happen,’ said Miss Edgar pleasantly. ‘Of course we know about Westminster Cathedral, but there must surely be a church nearer than that.’

  ‘Oh, yes, there is—St. Aloysius, and Father Bogart is the priest there. I believe he is a very nice man.’ ‘A lovely man’ was how Mrs. Ryan had described him at the jumble sale and I had often seem him on his bicycle, a fresh-faced young Irishman, waving to a parishioner or calling out ‘Bye-bye now!’ as he left one after a conversation.

  I gathered that they had ‘gone over’ in Italy, which seemed a suitable place to do it in, if one had to do it at all.

  ‘There was really no English church where we were,’ said Miss Boniface almost apologetically, ‘or at least, it was just a room in a house, you know, not at all inspiring.’

  ‘There was an altar at one end, I suppose it was the east,’ said Miss Edgar doubtfully, ‘but you could see that it was just a mantelpiece with the fireplace below it.’

  ‘We didn’t care for the priest either—Mr. Griffin—he was very Low,’ said Miss Boniface.

  ‘And the congregation was rather snobbish and unfriendly,’ said Miss Edgar. ‘You see, Bony and I were governesses and they were mostly titled people living in Italy for their own pleasure.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I can understand that,’ I said obscurely, and I did understand their feeling although their reasons appeared to be hardly adequate; no doubt there had been other and deeper ones, but I could not expect to be told about those.

  ‘I do hope you will let me know if there is anything I can do for you,’ I said, as I got up to leave. ‘Perhaps I can lend you cooking things and have you got bread and milk?’

  It seemed that they had everything, but we parted on very cordial terms. I could see us having interesting religious discussions, I thought, as I went upstairs to get ready for supper with Winifred and Julian Malory.

  ‘It seems a strange coincidence,’ I said, ‘but I remember coming to supper here just after Helena Napier moved in.’

  ‘Yes, and Julian had just received the anonymous donation for the restoration fund,’ said Winifred.

  ‘Did you ever find out who gave it?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, it was Allegra Gray,’ said Julian lightly. ‘Didn’t I tell you?’

  ‘No, I don’t think I ever knew. And I don’t think I should have guessed. I thought she was supposed to be poor,’ I added, remembering the extraordinarily delicate conversation about the rent which Julian had reported to us.

  ‘That made the giving all the more praiseworthy,’ said Julian.

  At this moment an unworthy thought occurred to me. Supposing I had given an anonymous donation of, say, twenty pounds, would Julian have got engaged to me? Had Allegra Gray regretted the donation when the engagement was broken off or had she simply not thought of it? Perhaps she was one of those generous people who do not remember when they have given money or think about it when it is gone . . . I stopped suddenly, remembering Rocky thrusting a pound note into my hand on the evening before they left. I supposed I must have put it into my bag and forgotten all about it.

  ‘Julian,’ I said, ‘I’ve done a terrible thing. Rocky Napier gave me a pound, he said it was to buy the best quality incense, and I forgot about it!’ I rummaged in my bag and found that it was still there folded up among a jumble of ration books, shopping lists, old letters and the other things that collect in bags.

  ‘How nice of him,’ said Julian. ‘I thought him a charming fellow. I’m so glad he made up that silly quarrel with his wife—she was very charming, too. Do you know, Mildred, I met her when I was coming out of church one evening and we went and had a drink together.’

  ‘She never told me that. She complained that it was always your boys’ club night,’ I said, admiring Helena for having managed it. ‘I shall miss them. The new people seem quite nice, though, two middle-aged spinsters.’

  ‘Ah, yes, very suitable.’ Julian nodded and became rather clerical again. ‘Church-goers, I’ve no doubt.’ He seemed resigned to the prospect of them.

  ‘I’m not sure about that,’ I laughed. ‘You’ll have to ask Father Bogart about it.’

  ‘Bogart, is it now? Are they after being Romans?’ asked Julian, his relief making him break into an Irish brogue.

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ I said, almost as if it were my fault. ‘But you wouldn’t grudge him a couple of gentlewomen, I’m sure. He hasn’t many such in his flock.’

  ‘I thought they looked very nice,’ said Winifred. ‘I happened to be passing when they were down talking to the furniture men. I hope we shall be able to be friends.’

  ‘They’ve lived in Italy for many years,’ I said.

  ‘Italy! Oh, how lovely!’ Winifred clasped her hands and I heard the familiar note of enthusiasm in her voice. Looking forward a little, I could almost imagine a time when Winifred might want to become a Roman Catholic and I wondered if I should be there to help with the crisis. That was something that had not so far fallen within my experience of helping or interfering in other people’s lives, and I wondered whether I should be capable of dealing with it.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Some time before the evening when I was to go to dinner at Everard Bone’s flat, the idea came into my mind that of course Esther Clovis would be there. It seemed the most likely thing in the world, especially as Everard was writing an article for a learned journal and was also busy on a book about his field-work in Africa. I should find her there correcting proofs or making an index, and the idea did not please me. I decided that I would try to make myself look like the kind of person who could not possibly do either, but it was not very easy. My normal appearance is very ordinary and my clothes rather uninteresting, but the new dress I had bought showed an attempt, perhaps misguided, to make myself look different. It was black, a colour I had never worn before except when I was in mourning after my parents’ death. I had often seen Helena in black, but her fair hair and complexion set it off better than my mousy colouring, and she had the knack of enlivening it with some brilliant touch of colour or ‘important jewel’ as one was told to do in the women’s magazines. I had no important jewels except for a good cameo brooch which had belonged to my grandmother, so I fastened this at the front of the little collar, brushed my hair back rather more severely than usual and looked altogether exactly the kind of person who would be able to correct proofs or make an index. Still, I reflected, Esther Clovis, with her dog’s hair, would probably be wearing a tweed suit and brogues. At least I should provide a contrast.

  As I was going out of the house, I met Miss Statham walking towards the church.

  ‘Hullo, dear,’ she said, peering at me with a doubtful expression on her face. ‘What’ve you done to your hair?’ she asked at last.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said feebly. ‘Nothing, really.’

  ‘It looks sort of scraped back as if you were going to have a bath,’ she said cheerfully. ‘If you don’t mind my saying so, it looked better the way you did it before.’

  ‘How did I do it before?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know, really, but it was softer somehow, more round the face.’

  Well, it was too late to do anything about it now and perhaps Miss Statham’s opinion was not worth bothering about. Softer, somehow, more round the face . . . who wanted to look like that? Certainly she herself was no oil-painting, as Dora would say.

  Suddenly she moved towards me and took my arm. “I knew I had something to tell you,’ she said. ‘I just popped into Barker’s on Saturday morning and who do you think I saw? You’ll never guess!’

  ‘Mrs. Gray?’ I suggested.

  ‘There, and I thought I’d surprise you! Well, anyway,’ she went on, recovering quickly from her disappointment, ‘I felt a bit awkward and was going to walk past—she was looking at some underwear, you see—but
, oh no, she came after me and began asking me what news in the parish and all about everybody and Father Malory, even—I didn’t know what to say.’

  ‘Well, you could have told her about the Christmas bazaar.’

  ‘Oh, I did and she said she might even come to it! You’d think she’d have a little shame, wouldn’t you? Anyway, it seems that she’s found a flat already, in the best part of Kensington, that’s what she said—oh, a much higher-class district than this. And there are three or four Anglo-Catholic churches, all within ten minutes’ walk and less.’

  ‘An embarras de richesse,’ I said.

  ‘What, dear? Anyway, the one she’s decided to go to has a vicar and two assistant priests and they’re none of them married! She told me that. They all live together in a clergy house.’

  ‘Goodness me, I suppose they need to band together to protect themselves and each other,’ I said.

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ said Miss Statham. ‘I’d almost feel like warning them to look out.’

  ‘Oh, I expect she’s tired of clergymen,’ I said. ‘To have been married to one and engaged to another, isn’t that perhaps enough?’

  ‘Well, I suppose you get a liking for a particular type of man,’ said Miss Statham tolerantly, ‘though they aren’t all as nice as Father Malory, I must say.’

  The bell started to ring for Evensong and Julian hurried out of the vicarage into the church.

  Miss Statham clapped her hand over her mouth and giggled. ‘Talk of the devil,’ she exclaimed, and hurried into church after him.

  I went on my way feeling a little less confident than when I had set out, though the interest of hearing about Allegra Gray helped a little to take my mind off my appearance. I felt more kindly disposed towards her now that she was removed from us and I did not grudge her the flat in the best part of Kensington or the three unmarried priests. I had no doubt that she would eventually marry one of them.

  I got off the bus and turned into the street where Everard’s flat was, only to find that I had walked straight into William Caldicote.

  ‘Why, it’s Mildred,’ he said, ‘but I hardly recognised you. You have a rather more triste appearance than usual—what is it?’ He stood back and contemplated me. ‘The hair, perhaps? The sombre dress?’ He shook his head. ‘Impossible to say, really.’

  ‘Do you think it an improvement?’ I asked apprehensively.

  ‘An improvement? Ah, well, I should hardly presume to express that kind of an opinion. You mean an improvement on the way you usually look? But how do you usually look? One scarcely remembers. Where are you going now? Were you perhaps coming to see me?’

  I thought I detected a note of alarm in his voice, so hastened to reassure him.

  ‘Ah, perhaps it’s just as well. I should not have been able to entertain you as I should have liked. I have a small bird en casserole in the oven, but it is such a very small bird, and now I am hurrying to my wine merchant, who should still be open, because I have just discovered, to my chagrin, that I have nothing but white wine in my little cellar!’

  ‘How dreadful,’ I murmured. ‘I suppose you will buy a bottle of Nuits St. Georges?’

  ‘Well, possibly. He has one or two quite drinkable burgundies. My only fear is that it will scarcely be chambré by the time I shall want to drink it.’

  ‘Well, why don’t you put the bottle by the fire or into some hot water for a few minutes?’ I suggested. ‘That should warm it up.’

  ‘Warm it up! Mildred, my dear, you mustn’t say such things. One can’t stand the shock. I might have expected such a remark from poor Dora but never from you.’

  I felt obscurely flattered. ‘If you are dining alone,’ I suggested, ‘nobody need know about it.’

  ‘Yes, you’re right, of course. There’s sometimes quite a pleasure in secret vice. One can feel really rather wicked and at the same time have the satisfaction of not harming anybody else—if that is a satisfaction.’

  ‘Oh, surely,’ I said. ‘And now I really must go. I’m supposed to be having dinner with somebody and I shall probably have to help with the cooking.’

  ‘How very anxious for you,’ said William. ‘I always like to have full control of a meal or no part in it at all. I’d rather not see people adding Bovril to the gravy and doing dreadful things like that.’

  We parted with mutual expressions of anxiety about the meal which each of us was going to eat, though William seemed a little complacent about his bird, I thought.

  When I rang the bell at Everard’s flat, I realised that I was late. Miss Statham and William had each delayed me a little, but it was better than being too early and having to walk slowly past the house in the dark, hoping I should not be seen from an upper window.

  ‘Oh, there you are,’ Everard said as he opened the door. Not exactly a welcoming speech but I knew him well enough now to realise that he never did appear pleased to see anybody.

  ‘I’m afraid I’m a little late,’ I said, taking off my coat and hanging it in the hall which had, I noticed with a slight shock, several fierce-looking African masks hanging on one wall. There was no looking-glass, which was just as well, and I waited with resignation for Everard to make some comment on my appearance. But to my relief none came, and after a time I realised that he evidently did not think I looked any different from usual. Unless, of course, he was too polite to say anything.

  He led me into a sitting-room where I noticed a decanter of sherry on a low table and a bottle of red wine by the gas-fire. I suppose I must have looked at it rather pointedly, remembering my conversation with William, for Everard commented on it.

  ‘I know what you are looking at,’ he said, ‘and I know it’s one of the unforgivable sins. I can only hope you’ll forget what you have seen and let it be a secret between us.’

  ‘I think perhaps that everybody puts wine by the fire secretly,’ I said. ‘I don’t think I should ever have known it was wrong if William Caldicote hadn’t told me. But what about the meat? Oughtn’t it to go in the oven?’

  ‘Oh, the woman got everything ready for me. She has put something in the oven,’ he said vaguely. ‘A bird, a chicken or something. I expect it will be all right. Perhaps you would help to take it out—at about half-past seven, I believe.’

  ‘Is it in a casserole?’

  ‘Oh, would it be? Then I dare say it is.’

  ‘And is there an oven cloth?’

  He looked a little worried for a moment but then a smile broke through. We sat down by the fire and he gave me a glass of sherry.

  ‘It should be hanging on a nail by the cooker, shouldn’t it?’ he said. ‘I seem to remember that.’

  Not an inspiring conversation, I thought, but it would do. We sat quite peacefully drinking sherry until I suddenly remembered about Esther Clovis. No doubt she would be arriving just before dinner, when I was taking the casserole out of the oven. No woman is at her best when taking something out of the oven, and I couldn’t even correct proofs or make an index.

  ‘Where is Miss Clovis?’ I asked.

  He looked surprised. ‘At home, I imagine. Where else should she be?’

  ‘I thought she might be coming to dinner.’

  ‘To dinner? Would you have liked me to invite her? I’m afraid I didn’t think of it.’

  ‘I thought you respected and esteemed her.’

  ‘Oh, certainly I do, but that doesn’t mean that I should want to ask her to dinner.’

  There was a silence, during which I looked round the room, which was pleasant but in no way remarkable or unusual. There was a large desk, a great many books and papers, but no photographs and nothing interesting on the mantelpiece, apart from a card announcing the autumn programme of the Learned Society.

  ‘How is your mother?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, quite well, thank you.’

  ‘And Miss Jessop?’

  ‘Miss Jessop?’

  ‘You know, the person who was in the room that evening when I had dinner with you.’
/>   ‘I’m afraid I don’t know anything about her.’

  ‘I think it may be time to see to that casserole,’ I said, getting up. ‘It’s just on half-past seven.’

  It turned out to be a very nice bird and I am sure that even William’s could not have been better. The red wine was perfectly chambré and our conversation improved quite noticeably, so that by the time we were sitting drinking coffee by the purring gas-fire the atmosphere between us was a pleasant and cosy one.

  ‘I should be interested to see the article you said you were writing for the Learned Journal,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, it’s very dull; I shan’t inflict that on you.’

  ‘Well, what about your book, then? How is it getting on?’

  ‘I have just had some of the proofs and then of course the index will have to be done. I don’t know how I’m going to find time to do it,’ said Everard, not looking at me.

  ‘But aren’t there people who do things like that?’ I asked.

  ‘You mean excellent women whom one respects and esteems?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose I did mean something like that.’

  There was a pause. I looked into the gas-fire, which was one degree better than the glowing functional bar into which I had gazed with Julian.

  ‘I was wondering . . .’ Everard began, ‘but no—I couldn’t ask you. You’re much too busy, I’m sure.’

  ‘But I don’t know how to do these things,’ I protested.

  ‘Oh, but I could show you,’ he said eagerly; ‘you’d soon learn.’ He got up and fetched a bundle of proof sheets and typescript from the desk. ‘It’s quite simple, really. All you have to do is to see that the proof agrees with the typescript.’

  ‘Well, I dare say I could do that,’ I said, taking a sheet of proof and looking at it doubtfully.

  ‘Oh, splendid. How very good of you!’ I had never seen Everard so enthusiastic before. ‘And perhaps you could help me with the index too? Reading proofs for a long stretch gets a little boring. The index would make a nice change for you.’

  ‘Yes, it would make a nice change,’ I agreed. And before long I should be certain to find myself at his sink peeling potatoes and washing up; that would be a nice change when both proof-reading and indexing began to pall. Was any man worth this burden? Probably not, but one shouldered it bravely and cheerfully and in the end it might turn out to be not so heavy after all. Perhaps I should be allowed to talk to Mrs. Bone about worms, birds and Jesuits, or find out who Miss Jessop really was and why an apology had been demanded from her.