“So I rang her up and said could I help and I’m staying here till the end of the week,” Octavia continued, “and then I can see Tommy.”
Lydia, lost in admiration of the ruthless methods of the daughter of the Deanery, was struck temporarily dumb.
“How do you think he’s looking?” said Octavia. “I haven’t seen it yet,” she continued without giving Lydia time to answer, “but Tommy says it’s pretty well healed now, which is rather a pity, but it can’t be helped. He doesn’t seem to know if they did it by the Fowkes-Brunter method or the Lanke-Ellerman, but I suppose being under an anæsthetic one wouldn’t notice much. Mother thinks we ought to get married soon.”
Leaving Lydia to digest this interesting information, Octavia returned to her duties, dealing out tea and small cakes with calm efficiency, speaking a kind word to everyone, occasionally asking Miss Horniman to tell her some guest’s name, which it was obvious she would now remember for ever. Miss Horniman introduced her to Lady Waring and rather to Lydia’s surprise they fell into earnest talk, while the neglected lover was happily engaged with Mr. Miller, who had been at college with his father.
Lady Waring now felt that the party had lasted long enough, so she began her good-byes, lingering a moment with Mr. Miller to ask news of Mrs. Brandon, who was a great friend of her Vicar and his wife.
“Mrs. Brandon is doing wonders,” said Mr. Miller. “What with the way she is looking after the land girls and running the little nursery school in her house, and the way my dear wife is caring for the evacuee children, several of whose parents in London have quite disappeared, we could not be a happier parish. And we hear that Mrs. Grant, her daughter’s mother-in-law, is quite safe in Calabria and is allowed to continue her work of collecting folk songs. And how is Sir Harry?”
Lady Waring said he was well and busy and how they hoped to see something of Mr. Needham.
“An excellent young man,” said the Vicar. “And though his views on ritual are not quite mine, he is perfectly sound about the Bishop and should go far.”
Lady Waring was glad to hear this and asked Mr. Miller to give her kindest regards to his wife. Mr. Miller, gratified, said indeed, indeed he would, and went away.
By this time Lady Waring, standing near the door had, as often happened though without any intention on her part, become the hostess, and good-byes were said to her quite as much as to Miss Horniman, who however took it all in very good part, being a strong-minded woman with no use for what she called social mumbo-jumbo. Lady Waring said she hoped Miss Horniman and Miss Crawley would come up to dinner the following night and Mr. Needham too, if he felt equal to it, and went away.
“I do wish,” said Mr. Needham to Lydia, who had lingered to speak to Octavia, “that people wouldn’t behave as if they were sorry for me. If they aren’t careful I’ll get an artificial arm just not to give them a chance.”
Octavia said she had seen a man in the Barchester General who had a marvellous artificial arm, but the trouble was one had to wear a glove on the hand and it looked so peculiar as one couldn’t always be changing it to match one’s real glove. Mr. Needham said he thought a gadget like one of those multiple tools that you can stick a punch, or a gimlet, or a screwdriver, or a tobacco-stopper into would be the thing. So leaving her friends to their lover-like talk Lydia joined her hostess and they all went home to tea.
No one was disappointed when Miss Horniman rang up next morning to say she was starting a cold and thought she had better not come.
“That will make us only one woman too many,” said Lady Waring. “Shall I ask that nice Colonel Winter, Harry?”
Sir Harry, who was not going to town that day, seemed pleased by the idea. Philip was rung up and accepted. For though Leslie Waring undoubtedly possessed highly irritating qualities, that was no reason to turn down an invitation to a pleasant house. Besides, one might show her, quite calmly and politely, that one didn’t really mind how annoying she was.
Lydia and Leslie spent most of the day in the garden, for the unnaturally mild weather continued and there was much to do. Leslie was now quite up to a couple of hours’ work and would have done more but that Lydia, having consulted Dr. Ford, took up an attitude of benevolent bullying and forced her to stop before she was tired. After one morning of defiance, which made her unfit to do much for the next two days, Leslie apologized very handsomely to Lydia and submitted to her authority.
“Stupid things women with brains are,” said Leslie, who was helping Lydia to have a bonfire of hedge cuttings in the kitchen garden. “They can’t look after themselves and they don’t know what they want.”
“You would know of course,” said Lydia, with entire candour. “But people who haven’t got brains are just as silly. I overdid it like anything at that hospital in Yorkshire, and—oh, well.”
“It seems to me if one’s born silly that’s that,” said Leslie, “however clever one’s mind may be. What one really needs is someone to bully one. You are a splendid bully, Lydia, but when I go back to London I’ll probably relapse.”
“Everyone ought to be married,” said Lydia stoutly, “unless of course they’ve got a very nice brother like Colin or Cecil to live with.”
“I hope I won’t have got too horrid to make a nice home for Cecil some day,” said Leslie, forking more clippings on to the bonfire, whose high wavering flames crackled agreeably. “I say, you did cut a lot off that hedge.”
“It needed it,” said Lydia. “All gone to height and a lot of dead wood. I’m sure you’ll make a very nice home for Cecil. And really, you must, else you’ll be settling down in London for ever.”
“And sharing a flat with someone called ‘My-friend-that-I-live-with,’” added Leslie grimly. “What I’d like to do—but it’s no good looking ahead—would be to live in the country and do something useful. I mean if Uncle Harry died and the war were over I’d like to live here and run the estate for Cecil and he might make the house into a sort of hostel for naval officers and their wives. It’s only a sort of idea and I suppose I oughtn’t to think about it, but I do so want to do something with Cecil. He’ll have to live here and if he isn’t bothered with the estate at first he might settle down and really get fond of it. And he could always go away for sailing holidays.”
Lydia listened with interest and was glad to hear Leslie making plans, for it showed that she was ready to begin working again, though Dr. Ford had refused to let her go back permanently under the three months, which would not be up for three weeks or so. She too thought of a future in the country, at her old home, perhaps spending the week in town with Noel and coming down for week-ends, perhaps as time went on living more at Northbridge with new ties to the place. But realizing with her excellent common sense that Leslie wished to talk a little about her own plans, not to hear about other people’s, she kept her thoughts to herself. They raked earth over the ashes of the bonfire, so that there should be no chance of a light after black-out, and walked back to the house.
In the yard they found Sergeant Hopkins and Selina.
“Oh please, madam,” said Selina to Lydia, “Sergeant Hopkins’s mother came over to see him to-day and she’s having a cup of tea in the kitchen before she goes and Sergeant Hopkins wants to know if you’d like to see her.”
“That’s right, miss,” said Sergeant Hopkins, “seeing as the Captain was so good to me and all.”
Rightly interpreting the Sergeant’s desire for her to meet his mother as a kind of thankoffering, the best he could bestow, for Colin’s care of him, Lydia said she would love it. Leslie said she would go in, and left them.
Lydia Merton was one of those rarely gifted women who can go into other people’s kitchens without giving mortal umbrage to the staff, though she never presumed upon this quality. Together with Sergeant Hopkins, she followed Selina into the warm, blacked-out kitchen, where a spare and still good-looking little elderly woman with a pleasant expression was sitting with Cook and Baker.
“It’s the Captain’s si
ster, mum,” said Sergeant Hopkins.
Lydia shook hands with Mrs. Hopkins, who conveyed the impression of a curtsy, though not actually dropping one. Sergeant Hopkins stood twisting his cap in his hands, waiting for some clash of intellect between the two powers. Selina’s eyes began to brim at the sight of the Sergeant’s mother and the Captain’s sister in the same room.
“We was just having our tea, madam,” said Cook. “I suppose you wouldn’t like a cup.”
Lydia said, quite truthfully, that she would love it, and hooking a chair with her leg dragged it next to Mrs. Hopkins and sat down. Mrs. Hopkins, at once recognizing Lydia as an equal, and knowing all about her family from her son, was entirely at her ease and favoured Lydia with a long account of her son’s good qualities, his deep understanding of the vegetable trade, his happy married life and his grief at his wife’s death, to all of which Lydia listened with real interest, telling Mrs. Hopkins in return, with a little exaggeration, how sorry Colin had been.
“You’ve not heard from the Captain yet, miss, have you?” said Sergeant Hopkins.
Lydia said cheerfully that she hadn’t, but one couldn’t possibly expect to for some time.
“The sergeant and me we took Mrs. Hopkins down to see mother this afternoon,” said Selina. “Mother was so pleased. She does like visitors. She showed Mrs. Hopkins Mr. Needham’s room, madam, and all his collars,” said Selina, her voice impeded by tears.
“Here, Mrs. Crockett, what’s the matter?” said Sergeant Hopkins.
“Nothing,” said Selina, wiping her eyes. “Only I thought Mother and Mrs. Hopkins were quite a picture together, and when I thought of your poor wife that couldn’t see it I was so upset.”
“Well, it’s to be hoped she did see it,” said Cook, who was a staunch churchwoman. “That’s what we’re taught, anyhow. Another cup of tea, Mrs. Hopkins.”
Mrs. Hopkins thanked Cook, but said she must be going, as she had to catch the train and anyway wouldn’t get back to Northbridge till after eight.
“It’s a bit dull,” she added, “getting back to an empty house. I’ll be glad when the war’s over and my Ted’s at home again. The vegetables could do with a man about the place and I’m not as young as I was. What I tell Ted is he ought to marry again. There’s plenty would be pleased to have him. I said so to Mrs. Allen this afternoon.”
At this remark all eyes turned on Sergeant Hopkins, who went quite crimson and twisted his cap harder than ever. Selina, still getting over her emotion at the thought of the late Mrs. Ted Hopkins’s celestial inability to see her mother-in-law and another old lady having a talk, appeared not to have heard. Lydia said good-bye to Mrs. Hopkins and got up to go. As she turned from the table she saw in the doorway Jasper, leaning against the doorpost.
“Well, come in or stay out as the saying is,” said Cook, rather loudly, for she stood no nonsense in her kitchen.
“I heerd someone talk about getting married,” said Jasper, looking round the assembly with his slanting gaze, his eyes almost veiled like a bird’s against the light.
“They say listeners hear no good of themselves,” said Cook sharply, and it seemed to Lydia irrelevantly.
“You must be Jasper Margett,” said Mrs. Hopkins, getting up. “I remember your father when I was a girl. Always up to some mischief or other and I dare say you’re the same. Come along, Ted, you and Mrs. Crockett can see me down to the station if Jasper Margett doesn’t mind making room for us to pass.”
Jasper melted from the doorway and the party dispersed.
Octavia Crawley and Mr. Needham were the first to arrive. Sir Harry expressed the hope that the walk in the dark had not been unpleasant. Octavia said there was a moon and she had a torch and Tommy had only stumbled once, but luckily she was holding his arm, so he had not fallen down. Mr. Needham looked as it he were undecided between gratitude or hatred for unnecessary kindness, but controlled himself. Sir Harry, who had been looking forward to a pair of billing and cooing young lovers, was a little disappointed, but his soldier’s heart warmed to the young chaplain with an empty sleeve and he determined to pump him after dinner, by which phrase he meant, on the whole, that he hoped to find a sympathetic audience for his stories about the last war.
Philip followed a few minutes later, delighted to meet Mr. Needham whom he remembered at Rose Birkett’s wedding, and quite resigned to meeting Octavia Crawley as she was an old acquaintance. Noel was also an old friend of both, so everyone was on very comfortable terms.
Looking across the dinner-table at her friend Octavia, Mrs. Noel Merton, bringing a fresh eye to bear on her, for they had not met in the last two years, thought she saw a faint but decided improvement. It is true that Octavia would always look, as Miss Pettinger had once said, exactly the type she would wish the Barchester High School to turn out, but there was added to her a kind of laborious neatness, just spoilt by a touch of peasant arts, which seemed familiar, though Lydia could not quite place the type. She had acquired a not very good permanent wave in her uninteresting hair; her dress, obviously a standardized utility product, had some faint approach to style, though it might have fitted better across the shoulders; and her talk, though far from sparkling, appeared to be sensible, for Sir Harry was listening to her with attention. As Mr. Needham on her left was talking to Leslie, Lydia listened placidly to Sir Harry and Octavia on her right, and heard her expounding the theory of day nursery-schools with cheap lunches in a lucid and not too overbearing manner. Sir Harry, who was exercised about the growing number of married women in the neighbourhood who either wanted to do part-time war work and were prevented by their young children, or didn’t want to do part-time war work because of their young children and were pushed into it by the combined efforts of the Labour Exchange at Winter Overcotes and the lure of easy money, had been considering the possibility of this kind of state foster-motherhood, but had not had time to go properly into it.
“You know I don’t like it, Miss Crawley,” he said. “It seems all wrong to me, the whole business, and I know the husbands don’t like it at all, but one has to face facts.”
“I always do,” said Octavia. “Of course, as I’m Red Cross I’m all right, but if I had to work in a factory, or wanted to, I think I’d be glad to have my children properly looked after. You know Mrs. Miller has done it at Pomfret Madrigal, at least at Grumper’s End, where there are a lot of children, mostly illegitimate, and it’s a great success. All the married and unmarried mothers go to the factory over on the other side of the village every day and earn heaps of money and some of them are going to marry properly, the older key-men who come from the Hogglestock rolling mills, which you know are working full time now. Of course a certain number are going to have more illegitimate children,” said Octavia in a business-like manner, “but they’d have them anyway.”
She then gave a few statistics about the expense of starting and maintaining such schools.
“Well, well,” said Sir Harry, a little taken aback by his young guest’s knowledge of life, but impressed by what she said, “that’s all very interesting. How did you learn it all?”
“I thought I ought to,” said Octavia. “You see I’m going to marry Tommy as soon as he gets a living, so I thought I’d better learn something useful. I pretty well know the parish work because I’ve got two brothers in the Church and two sisters who married clergymen and I’ve stayed with them a lot. Of course I like nursing better than anything, and the war’s a splendid opportunity,” said Octavia, her face lighting up in so far as such an uninteresting face could be said to do such a thing, “but I shall give it up as soon as I marry. Besides, it is my duty to have a large family and if I let my own children go to a village nursery school I shall be freer to run the parish front. I don’t know what you think about the optional changes in the marriage service, Sir Harry, but I don’t approve them at all, nor does my father. The Bishop of course does.”
Sir Harry was not quite sure whether the marriage service, authorized or revised, was quite th
e thing for the dinner-table, but any implied criticism of the Bishop was grateful to him, and he joined his guest in tearing the Palace to ribbons.
At this moment Selina, who had been handing a casserole of rabbit, withdrew to the sideboard.
“Selina has forgotten you,” said Leslie to Mr. Needham. “She must be flustered.”
But before she could take steps about it, Selina was back with a plate. On it were arranged rabbit, potato, vegetables, all neatly cut up and thoughtfully arranged, even to the cutting of the larger brussels sprouts in two. She then retired to the kitchen to tell Cook how upset she felt at seeing the poor gentleman eating so nicely with only the one arm.
Leslie, feeling that Mr. Needham might be embarrassed by this tender attention, did not say anything, and Mr. Needham now claimed Lydia’s notice.
While he talked with great pride of his regiment and its prowess, appearing to consider himself as on the whole higher than the colonel, though not puffed up, Lydia looked at him also with a fresh eye. She thought of the very young Tommy who had been so susceptible to every nice woman or girl that he met; she remembered his incredibly dilatory courtship of Octavia and how, but for her vigorous action, they would never have got engaged at all; she remembered how she had looked upon Tommy with what was almost good-natured contempt, and how Noel had at one time imagined that she might care for the Dean’s secretary, a thought that suddenly made her laugh, which she so rarely did.
Mr. Needham stopped talking and looked at her.
“Sorry, Tommy,” said Lydia, recovering herself at once. “I was only thinking how different we all were when you think of us before the war. I mean we are a bit different.”
“By Jove, yes,” said Mr. Needham. “I must say everyone at home seems a bit different. The old ones look a lot older and all my own lot seem to have such a lot of responsibility. Fine fun for me,” said Mr. Needham apologetically, “having such a splendid time in Libya with my regiment, but I can tell you, Lydia, I feel a perfect worm to see all your people carrying on here with none of the fun. Look at Octavia. Doesn’t she look wonderful to-night?”
Growing Up Page 24