The Brandons: A Virago Modern Classic (VMC)

by Angela Thirkell

  Miss Morris with an incoherent apology left the room. Rose, who had cleared away as slowly as possible, had the intense pleasure of hearing her give a kind of dry sob as she went upstairs, and so was able to prepare the kitchen agreeably for the worst. Nor was it long before the worst occurred, for Nurse, taking the black dress to Miss Morris’s room, knocked, had no answer, went in and found her trying to take off her blue dress and shaking uncontrollably from head to foot. With the light of battle in her eye Nurse mobilised the household. Mrs Brandon came hurrying upstairs with Delia just in time to receive the full blast of the breakdown which, to do Miss Morris justice, was no more than her due after the last weeks. Beyond kind words Mrs Brandon could not do much, but Delia, well up in first aid, so bullied her patient, standing no nonsense of any sort, that within ten minutes Miss Morris had drunk sal volatile, cried, choked, drunk more sal volatile, somehow got undressed while crying violently all the time, and was in bed with a hot water bottle, in fact with two, as Nurse and Ethel each considered it her own special office. Delia then drove her not unwilling mother away, told Nurse and Ethel she didn’t want them, and installed herself firmly by the patient.

  When Dr Ford, urgently summoned by Mrs Brandon, arrived, he said there was nothing wrong with Miss Morris at all and a good fit of hysterics would do her good, left a sleeping draught to be taken with a light supper, and promised to look in next day. Just outside the gate of Stories he nearly ran over Mr Grant and pulled up.

  ‘Oh,’ said Mr Grant, ‘I was just going to ask if Mrs Brandon was all right.’

  ‘I can’t think why you want to know,’ said Dr Ford unsympathetically. ‘Fit as a fiddle. Always is. Miss Morris has just been having hysterics. Do her all the good in the world. Funeral’s the day after tomorrow.’

  ‘It’s awfully lucky that Miss Morris had Mrs Brandon to look after her,’ said Mr Grant reverently.

  ‘Mrs Brandon is one of the most charming women I know,’ said Dr Ford, making a horrible noise with his gears, ‘but no use in a sick room. Your little friend Delia is the one with a head on her shoulders. She handled that woman as if she had been born a nurse. See you at the funeral, I suppose.’

  He clanked away, leaving Mr Grant to consider his words. Deeply did he resent having Delia called his little friend, as if he were in knickerbockers. Deeply did he resent any suggestion that Mrs Brandon was not perfect. The first seed of doubt as to the infallibility of his goddess was sown, and he found the feeling most uncomfortable. Broad-mindedly, he admitted that one might have a worse person than Delia to look after one in a crisis; he could quite see that she might be a tower of strength. But he didn’t want towers of strength. For him an exquisite, shrinking, delicate woman, to whom he could say, ‘Mrs Brandon, I am here. Have no fear,’ and embroidering on this delightful theme he went back to the Vicarage.

  Cook felt it would go against her conscience to send up calves’ foot jelly till it had stood twenty-four hours, but put her whole soul into the beef tea, and at seven o’clock a tray was ready. Delia annoyed the whole staff, though probably preventing bloodshed, by coming into the kitchen, seizing the tray, and taking it up herself. She then administered the sleeping draught and the beef tea, and when she came down to dinner was able to announce that the patient was dozing. As the drug took possession of her senses, Miss Morris thought of the day that was now ending, from the nurse’s call in the early morning to the disgraceful but blessed fit of crying that had left her so relaxed and sleepy. Only one thing troubled her in her half-dreaming state and that was that her father and Mr Miller had been arguing so fiercely about something. She knew her father was right, but Mr Miller had such a pleasant face and such gentle ways that she felt sure he could not be wrong. Surely Mr Miller had said something about those very happy days in the past. Yes, very happy they had been, above all in that summer when Mr Miller was being coached by her father and the weather was so fine. So Miss Morris slid gently back into them, and when Delia came tiptoeing in after dinner, all she had to do was to switch off the reading light, before installing herself in the Green dressing-room where she most unnecessarily proposed to spend that evening and sleep the night.

  9

  Miss Morris Relents

  After a good night’s rest and a morning in bed, Miss Morris was much better. She thanked Delia warmly for her care, but it was sadly evident that the full force of her gratitude was reserved for Mrs Brandon. When a reserved nature allows itself to show feeling, it does it with a vengeance, and Miss Morris’s devotion began to loom alarmingly, taking the form of wanting to help Mrs Brandon with the accounts and the flowers. Mrs Brandon felt that she ought to be touched, but found herself irritated, for her accounts lived in a peculiar muddle which she felt unequal to explaining, and she liked fussing over the flowers herself. However, with real kindness she let Miss Morris help Nurse, who had constituted herself a kind of co-guardian with Delia of their guest’s welfare, to go through the linen cupboard and mark some new sheets, which Miss Morris did with exquisitely fine embroidery. Miss Morris also offered to read aloud in the evening, but after one experience gave it up. Francis, alarmed, had made a pretext of work to do and left the room, Delia had slipped away to play the gramophone, and Mrs Brandon had got into such a muddle of trying to get her tapestry right and look as if she were listening, that Miss Morris’s sense of humour, almost buried alive by her old ladies, got loose, and she laughed quietly at herself and gave up the attempt. Her own future was going to be a matter of concern, but Mrs Brandon had refused even to hear anything about it till after the funeral, and for a few days Miss Morris resigned herself to drift, enjoying the sunshine and the garden and her comfortable bedroom.

  Miss Brandon’s funeral took place at the little church of Pomfret Abbas, whose vicar had gone in fear of his patroness for many years, while deeply grateful for her subscriptions to his various charities. It was not expected that many people would be there, for all Miss Brandon’s contemporaries were dead and she had few friends.

  When the car from Stories arrived with the Brandons and Miss Morris, Sir Edmund was standing at the church porch counting the arrivals.

  ‘Morning, Lavinia,’ he said. ‘Poor house. Very poor house. Not seen a worse one since old Potter was buried, you know, the man over near Rushwater who used to shoot foxes. Bad time of year for a funeral with nearly everyone away or abroad. Pomfret would have come but he’s away on a cruise with the young Fosters. The Dean went to Finland yesterday. Can’t think why he went to Finland. Palestine more in his line, I should have thought. Don’t stand about in the sun. I’ve kept places for you inside.’

  Francis made Delia giggle by saying sotto voce that they wouldn’t have been much good outside, and they all followed Sir Edmund up the aisle. Mrs Brandon looked like a ravishing widow in the black pleated frock, Miss Morris looked distinguished in the georgette, and Delia had compromised in her mother’s black and white foulard with a black coat over it.

  ‘I put you well up in front,’ said Sir Edmund, taking no pains to moderate his voice. ‘You are about the nearest relations poor Amelia had. Who’ll be chief mourner, you know.’

  So saying he herded them into the pew usually reserved on happier occasions for the bride’s father and mother and went away to look for fresh prey.

  Mrs Brandon looked about her and saw a few familiar faces. Roddy Wicklow, Lord Pomfret’s agent, evidently representing the family; Mr Leslie from Rushwater House, who had often drawn on Miss Brandon’s purse for various county charities; Lord Stoke, who never missed a funeral and had put off going to Aix on purpose to attend; Mr and Mrs Keith from Northbridge Manor. At the back of the church a number of tenants and all the indoor and outdoor servants from the Abbey made a fairly respectable show. Presently Sir Edmund came back with Mr Miller and Mr Grant whom he put into the front pew across the aisle.

  ‘He’s a relation too,’ said Sir Edmund to Mrs Brandon. ‘Nice of Miller to come with him, but a bit awkward for the Vicar here. Must put you off yo
ur stroke a bit to see another professional looking at you.’

  A rather majestic scuffling was now heard near the door. It was Lady Norton, more imposing than ever in gait and array, wearing a kind of plumed hussar’s hat, carrying with her Mrs Grant.

  ‘Good God!’ exclaimed Sir Edmund, far more loudly than the atmosphere of a sacred edifice warrants, ‘it’s Victoria Norton. Who’s that with her?’

  Mrs Brandon looked round and saw Mrs Grant, wearing her homespun, but paying homage to the conventions by having substituted for her amber and coral beads a heavy jet necklace and jet earrings.

  The sexton attempted to usher Lady Norton into an empty pew behind the Brandons, but her ladyship, who was used to sitting on the platform at public meetings, was not so to be put off.

  Taking a good look through her lorgnon at the congregation, she spied out Mr Miller and Mr Grant and entered graciously into their pew, driving them up into the far corner.

  ‘You will want to sit by your boy, Felicia,’ she said to Mrs Grant. ‘Dear me, how he has grown since I saw him at Frinton ten years ago. If you will come on my other side, Mr Miller, then Mrs Grant can sit between me and Hilary.’

  After a little confusion Mrs Grant edged past Mr Miller and sat next to her unwilling son. It would not be true to say that he had forgotten about his mother, to whom he dutifully wrote every day at her express desire, but he hoped so much that she would not descend on him again for the present that he had managed to persuade himself that his wish was a fact. Heroically keeping back the scowl which he would willingly have bestowed upon her, he shook hands, not quite sure whether kissing was permissible in church.

  ‘Dear boy,’ said Mrs Grant. ‘Come stai?’

  ‘Oh, I’m all right,’ said Mr Grant, and then mercifully the harmonium pealed and he was safe. That the whole congregation had their eyes riveted on Lady Norton’s funereal plumes and his mother’s swinging earrings he knew only too well.

  The little service was soon over and Miss Brandon’s coffin laid in the hideous family grave consisting of a block of red granite weighing about three tons with the words ‘I am hiding in thee’ picked out in black along the edge, where her parents reposed. Mr Simpson, who had been hovering usefully about, then came forward to suggest refreshments, but no one wanted to go to the Abbey and there was no one to be offended if they didn’t, so the offer was politely refused and Mr Simpson, entirely unmoved, vanishes from these pages for evermore.

  Mrs Brandon and the party exchanged a few civil words with Lady Norton and hoped she was coming to their Church Fête on Saturday. Lady Norton said she would certainly try to, and as Felicia Grant was coming back to Pomfret Madrigal on Saturday, she could drive her over and visit the Fête at the same time.

  ‘I didn’t know you were coming back to us so soon,’ said Mrs Brandon to Mrs Grant, to break the silence. She then felt she might have put it better.

  ‘Yes, yes, my little giro with Victoria is over,’ said Mrs Grant gaily, ‘and I am coming back to see something of dear Hilary before I return to Italy. I have got my little room at the Cow and Sickle with our good Mr Spindler.’

  Mrs Brandon knew that she ought to ask Mrs Grant to Stories. She had a spare bedroom and a very adequate staff and there was really no excuse at all for not showing hospitality, but she felt that Miss Morris, with her devotion and her willingness to help, was all she could bear, so she delayed for a moment, fighting her lower but really more sensible self.

  Mr Miller, with the better excuse of a small and not very competent staff, was going through the same agony. What added to his perplexity was that he knew his pupil would dislike above all things to have his mother on the premises, but his strong sense of duty overpowered all considerations of reason.

  ‘I do hope, Mrs Grant,’ he said, ‘that you will allow me to offer the hospitality of the Vicarage. The Cow cannot be really comfortable and I have a spare room at your disposal. If you would honour it, we should do our very best to make you comfortable.’

  Mr Grant could have martyred his coach with the greatest of pleasure. Yet into his fury crept a certain admiration, for he knew that in the rather scantily furnished house Mr Miller had not room in his little bedroom for all his belongings and kept a good many of them in the cupboard in the spare room, and had to move them out whenever he had a guest.

  ‘Mr Miller has taken the words out of my mouth,’ said Mrs Brandon untruthfully. ‘I don’t want to interfere, Mr Miller, but if Mrs Grant cared to come to Stories I should be delighted and we are only a step from the Vicarage.’

  At this Francis and Delia, who did not know that she was making amends to her own conscience by trying to give discomfort to everyone else, could equally have murdered their mother.

  ‘How kind you all are,’ cried Mrs Grant. ‘What can I say? Even in Calabria I have never received such hospitality. Shall I do as I used to when all my dear peasants invited me to their huts, and spend a week in each?’

  Francis said ‘No’ so loudly that it was almost audible, and Delia made a face at Mr Grant which he answered with another face before he knew what he was doing. Mr Miller ardently wished that he had not spoken first and Mrs Brandon as ardently wished she had let well alone, and all the young people hated the grown-ups who had landed them in this unconscionable mess, when Lady Norton, for the first time in her life being of some real use, told Mrs Grant to take her advice and go back to the Cow.

  ‘You’ll be a fool if you don’t, Felicia,’ she said. ‘Mrs Spindler was my kitchen-maid for three years and is a very nice woman. Go to her and you can do what you like, and she can cook vegetarian things, because Norton had to have them on account of his gastric trouble. And if you want to go folkloring in the evening it won’t matter if you are late for meals. Mrs Brandon and Mr Miller have guests already, so you’ll only be a nuisance.’

  ‘Well, I daresay you are right, Victoria,’ said Mrs Grant, enjoying this competition for her favours. ‘And I left two trunks and a lot of Calabrian pottery at the Cow, so I might as well go back. But we will all meet often and merrily,’ she added, jangling her earrings.

  Mrs Brandon and Mr Miller, freed from this pressing terror, felt they didn’t care how often or how merrily they met so long as Mrs Grant was not staying under either of their roofs, and began feverishly to plan dinners and lunches for Mrs Grant.

  ‘Come along, Felicia,’ said Lady Norton. ‘Lunch will be waiting. Goodbye, Mrs Brandon; goodbye, Mr Miller. I shall certainly come over to the Fête on Saturday.’

  After exchanging a few words with friends, largely it is to be feared with the intention of getting them to come to the Fête, Mrs Brandon moved towards the car when a thought struck her. She paused, looked at Miss Morris, went on again and then stopped once more.

  ‘I was thinking,’ she said to Miss Morris, ‘of asking Mr Miller and Mr Grant to come back to lunch, because I know it is his cook’s day off. But if it would be at all uncomfortable for you —’

  Miss Morris hastened to say that she would of course like it very much.

  ‘I can’t tell you how ashamed I still am of my rudeness the other day,’ she said. ‘When I think how good you have been to me I feel I can never apologise enough. If only you knew how grateful I am for all your kindness.’

  ‘Then that will be very nice,’ said Mrs Brandon, suppressing a desire to say that Miss Morris would give her great pleasure by never being grateful again. Then she issued her invitation to Mr Miller, who said, Indeed, indeed they would be delighted to come.

  Lunch passed off very pleasantly indeed. Mr Miller was a little nervous at first, but Miss Morris was again the calm, competent woman that Mrs Brandon had first met, and spoke to the Vicar as if he were any ordinary human being. While Rose was about, the conversation was general, though one thought was naturally uppermost in all minds, and when they were at last alone over coffee, Francis was the first to voice it.

  ‘When does one know about people’s wills?’ he inquired of the company at large. ‘Don�
��t tell me not to say things like that, Mamma. I thought we all came home to a feast after the funeral and had pork pie and ham and bottled beer and cheese and whisky and then the lawyer read the will aloud and everyone was disappointed.’

  Delia, who had talked the matter over thoroughly with Francis and had read one or two Victorian novels, said yes, and another will would be found in a hat box and they would all have a million pounds and she would spend a lot of it at the Fête.

  Francis said she was counting her chickens before they were hatched.

  ‘Well, what really does happen?’ said his mother. ‘Mr Miller, you are always having funerals. What do they do?’

  Mr Miller had to confess that he had never been present at one of those gatherings dear to the older novelists when the will is read over madeira and seedcake, but he said that judging from his own very small personal experience when his aunt left him two thousand pounds of worthless Brazilian stock, Miss Brandon’s lawyers would write to anyone concerned as soon as possible.