Mrs. Tim of the Regiment

by D. E. Stevenson

  ‘There’s MacQuill,’ says Guthrie suddenly, looking up from his task of packing the basket of crockery. ‘Shall I shout to him to come with us? He’ll get drenched.’

  We all look up, and I am just in time to see a man running up the little path between the trees. He is wearing a grey flannel suit and has no hat.

  ‘It can’t be Hector MacQuill,’ Tony points out. ‘This is the last place he would come.’

  ‘It was Hector. I saw him distinctly,’ replies Guthrie, white with rage.

  Tony merely smiles incredulously.

  I realise there are the makings of a first-class row – it seems strange that these two men can never speak to each other without getting hot.

  ‘Whoever it was, he will get frightfully wet,’ I remark pacifically, as a few large splashes of rain fall on my bare arms, and another peal of thunder echoes rumblingly amongst the mountains.

  ‘It was Hector MacQuill,’ says Guthrie obstinately. He picks up two large baskets and several rugs, and, thus laden, marches off.

  The rest of us collect the remainder of the feast, and follow him as fast as we are able. Dobbie is struggling with the hood of the Bentley. Tony rushes to help him. We all scramble into our seats, and the coats and rugs are thrown in on the top of us. Then the heavens seem to open, and the rain comes down in a blinding white sheet of water. The very trees bend under its weight.

  ‘It’s not been a very nice afternoon,’ Dobbie remarks, understating the facts with typical Lowland phlegm, as he climbs into his seat and shuts the door. I notice that, in these few moments, his uniform is soaked through, and the water is trickling down the back of his neck.

  Mrs. Loudon agrees with him; she is too used to Dobbie’s imperturbability to be surprised at his words.

  ‘Will we start home, Mrs. Loudon?’ he enquires, mopping his face with a blue handkerchief, ‘or will we wait a wee while till the shower’s past?’

  The ‘shower’ is drumming on the roof like the rattle of musketry, and Mrs. Loudon has to raise her voice to make herself heard.

  ‘We’ll get home as quickly as we can,’ she says. ‘I’ll not have your death at my door, sitting there dripping as if you’d just been taken out of the loch. Away home, and mind you get changed as soon as possible.’

  Dobbie murmurs something about ‘a wee thing damp’, but he knows Mrs. Loudon too well to argue about it, and soon we are squelching through the mud like a buffalo in a wallow, with the rain beating on the windows and the thunder growling overhead.

  ‘Who would have thought it would turn out like this?’ enquires Mrs. Falconer blandly. ‘It reminds me of a picnic I went to when I was a child ’

  The thunder has made my head ache, so I lie back in my corner and try not to hear; but it is impossible not to hear. Why are we not provided with earlids to work in the same way as eyelids, so that if we want to be quiet we may shut our ears and drift away upon our own thoughts? As it is I am forced to listen to a lengthy account of the picnic which Mrs. Falconer attended at the age of eight, clad in a muslin frock and a blue sash. Today being what it is, and Mrs. Falconer being reminded of the occasion by the storm, it is only logical to suppose that these frail garments were completely ruined by the elements; but I can’t be certain of this, for I never heard the story finished. Mrs. Loudon, who for some time has been wrapped in her own thoughts – perhaps she has invisible earlids – suddenly leans forward and says:

  ‘Dobbie – was that young Mr. MacQuill who passed up the path just before the storm broke?’

  ‘There wasn’t anybody passed me,’ Dobbie replies. ‘I never saw anybody all the time I was there. It’s a lonely sort of spot – a bit eerie to my mind.’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ replies Mrs. Loudon thoughtfully.

  I can see she is puzzled by the mystery of the disappearing man (and it certainly seems very queer, for the path he took was narrow and led only to the place where we left the cars) but the disappearing lady was an even more perplexing phenomenon, and I can’t help wondering what Mrs. Loudon would have made of that. For myself I can make nothing of it at all, and, in spite of an inner voice which assures me that there are no such things as ghosts, I am forced to the somewhat awesome conclusion that there must be, and that I have seen one with my own eyes in broad daylight. If Tony had not seen it too – but then he did. It is all very puzzling.

  Ninth June

  Guthrie says, ‘But people do take the wrong turning sometimes, Hester, and then they can’t go back.’

  We have been talking trivialities until now I can’t remember what but there is suddenly a strained note in Guthrie’s voice which catches my attention and holds it fast. I roll over on the soft turf and look at him in surprise. He is raised on one elbow, and is very busy digging little holes in the grass with his fingers. High up in the blue sky a lark is singing a perfect paean of praise to its Creator, the loch dreams in the sunshine, devoid of the slightest ripple, a faint haze hovers over the low marshy ground, and shimmers in the noonday heat.

  ‘But people can always go back to the crossroads, Guthrie.’

  ‘Not in life,’ he says gravely.

  Suddenly my heart hammers in my throat, and I search wildly for words. ‘Guthrie, if people have only gone a little way down the wrong road, they can still turn back – the crossroads are in sight – ’ ‘No,’ he replies, digging his little holes with frightful industry. ‘No, Hester. A man’s got to go forward all the time. Besides, people are sometimes farther down the road than you think distance is deceptive sometimes.’

  ‘Guthrie!’

  ‘Let’s go home,’ he says. ‘It’s hopeless for fishing today. I think I shall take my gun, and get a few rabbits for Mother.’

  As we stroll over the hill I search wildly for words to influence Guthrie. Quite obviously his strange talk refers to his relations with Elsie. He has come to see her in her true light, but intends – like the obstinate chivalrous creature he is – to marry her all the same. It would have been bad enough for him to marry Elsie thinking her a paragon amongst women, but to marry her with no such delusion is infinitely worse. Sailors don’t see very much of their wives, and Guthrie might have gone on for years thinking her perfect in every way. The awful thing about it is that it is all my fault. I have laid myself out to be nice to him. I have tried to show him that a woman can be a friend, and it seems that he has learnt his lesson only too well. I have rushed in where angels might well have feared to tread, and destroyed his illusions to no purpose. Far better if I had left Guthrie alone, and returned to Biddington by the first train. Far better if I had stood aside, or made myself deliberately disagreeable to the man. This is what comes of trying to meddle with people’s lives; you achieve your object and find it is a disaster.

  At last I can bear it no longer, and I seize my companion by the arm.

  ‘Guthrie!’ I cry, ‘it’s not fair to tell me a little and then not let me speak to you. You’ve simply got to listen to me.’

  He smiles down at me a little wearily. ‘My dear, I didn’t mean to tell you anything. I’m kicking myself now if that’s any consolation to you.’

  ‘None whatever,’ I reply firmly. ‘Sit down there and let me speak to you.’

  We sit down upon a fallen tree, whereupon speech deserts me. I have so much to say that nothing will come.

  ‘Well, go on,’ he says quite gently.

  ‘Guthrie, you really mustn’t do it,’ I say at last. ‘You’ve no idea what you’re doing, or you would not think of it. You’ve no idea what marriage is. I’ve been married for twelve years, and I can tell you this – happiness is only possible when two people have the same ideas.’

  ‘Everybody says marriage is a lottery, so what does it matter?’ says Guthrie.

  ‘It may be a lottery, but why draw the wrong number on purpose?’ I reply quickly.

  ‘I’ve drawn my number.’

  ‘Oh, Guthrie, do listen to me! Don’t make a mess of your whole life because you are too proud to say you have made a mis
take.’

  ‘There is no question of making a mess of my life. Elsie is a dear little girl, and I’m very fond of her; it is only – ’

  ‘It is only that you have nothing in common,’ I interrupt him breathlessly. ‘Guthrie, do listen to me, and believe that I know what I’m talking about it wouldn’t be quite so bad if you could marry and settle down in a home with friends round you, and each have your own interests and amusements, but Service people can’t do that. They’ve got to be pals, making each other do for everything, finding their home, and their friends, and their interests all in each other.’

  He looks at me with a face gone suddenly white under its tan. ‘My dear, I know. But I can’t go back – she trusts me – she has promised to marry me.’

  I cry to him angrily, ‘And do you suppose that she will be happy? Be sensible for her sake if you won’t be sensible for your own.’

  ‘I think I can make her happy,’ he replies stiffly.

  We walk on in silence.

  Tenth June

  Mrs. Loudon announces at breakfast that she is going to have a dinner party. The announcement is received by Guthrie with unmitigated scorn. He says that dinner parties are a winter sport, only just bearable in towns where people are herded together in any case – and that it will spoil an evening’s fishing, and, anyway, nobody will come.

  Mrs. Loudon replies with spirit that he need not come unless he wants to, there are plenty of people to ask. That nice Major Morley, for instance.

  Guthrie says he won’t come.

  Mrs. Loudon retorts that we shall see whether he will or not, but, for her part, she has no doubt about it – and we can ask Miss Baker and her father, if Guthrie likes.

  Guthrie says he won’t come, anyway – he never goes out anywhere. Mrs. Loudon says if he doesn’t want to come he can refuse the invitation, and she intends to ask the MacArbins, because they never have any fun, and Hester ought to see them.

  Guthrie says why not ask the MacQuills too.

  Mrs. Loudon says it’s a pity we can’t, but it might be a little too exciting if they went for each other in the drawing room.

  Guthrie says, ‘My God, what a party!’ and opens the newspaper ostentatiously.

  Mrs. Loudon repairs to her desk, writes three notes in record time, and summons Dobbie to deliver them – she is not in the habit of letting the grass grow under her feet.

  ‘ – and we can just go ahead with the preparations,’ she says, looking at me over the top of her spectacles as she sits at her desk. ‘For they’ll all jump at it.’

  ‘When is it to be?’ I ask her.

  ‘Tonight, of course,’ replies the indomitable woman. ‘Where’s the sense of putting things off ? If I’m feeling like having a dinner party, I have it. And you can dress the flowers for the table,’ she adds trenchantly, ‘for I know perfectly well that you’ll not let me do it in peace.’

  I am about to leave the room when Mrs. Loudon recalls me ‘Salmon, and lamb, and peas, and trifle,’ she says, frowning anxiously. ‘Would you give them soup as well, Hester, or yon newfangled grapefruit?’

  – I vote for soup, whereupon Mrs. Loudon’s brow clears.

  ‘It’s cold fare for an empty stomach, grapefruit,’ she says. ‘I’ll admit they always give me the gooseflesh. Whereas a nice spoonful of Julienne is a comforting sort of start.’

  Guthrie now appears, looking quite pleasant again – his ill humours are always short-lived – and remarks that there is a fine breeze on the loch, and can Hester come, or does his mother intend to work her all day long like a galley slave over this forsaken dinner? Mrs. Loudon replies that she does not work Hester like a galley slave, and perhaps Guthrie has forgotten that galley slaves were used to row ships when he chose that particular metaphor.

  Guthrie actually has the grace to blush, though protesting, not altogether truthfully, that we always take it in turns to row.

  We collect the fishing tackle and make our way down to the loch, where we find Betty and a boy of about her own age – or slightly older digging in the gravel. Annie is sitting close by, knitting a multicoloured jumper, which, I feel sure, must be intended for Bollings – Tim’s batman – to whom she is engaged. Guthrie says he has no idea who the boy can be unless he is one of Donald’s offspring, which are numbered as the sands of the sea. I reply that Betty would find another child to play with her if she were marooned upon a desert island.

  At this moment Betty sees us, and calls out that Ian is showing her how to dam the burn with stones. Guthrie says he knows how to damn the burn without stones.

  ‘Oh, do you? How?’ says Betty with interest.

  I feel slightly worried at the probable development of this conversation, as it looks as though it might turn out to have a damaging effect upon my child’s morals (no pun intended).

  Ian now remarks, in a soft Highland voice, that he is aware the burn could be dammed with sods, but he doots the laird would like us to be cutting them.

  I can see that Guthrie is about to say that he can damn it without sods, so I make a face at him and he remains silent.

  Betty now says that she is tired of damming burns, so can she and Ian come fishing with us if they promise to be very quiet? (She knows from experience that this promise usually appeals to the adult mind.) Guthrie says they may, and we all embark without further ado.

  It is a grey, cloudy day with small ripples and a whitish glare upon the water. The top of Ben Seoch is swathed in mist. Guthrie takes out his rod and says solemnly he is doubtful about the fish today. They don’t as a rule take well with mist on the mountains. I reply facetiously that the fish can’t possibly know about the mist unless somebody has told them.

  ‘But the kelpies tell them, of course,’ replies Guthrie gravely. ‘I thought you knew that much, Hester. How ignorant you are, to be sure!’

  Ian gazes at Guthrie with large brown eyes, and asks if Mr. Loudon has ever seen a kelpie talking to the fishes. This puts the good man in rather a hole, and he spends some time fabricating a long and somewhat complicated answer to the question.

  After a couple of drifts during which no rise is seen, Betty begins to get slightly restive, and asks why Guthrie doesn’t catch a fish – don’t the fish want to get caught? She thinks that fish like worms best, and, if Guthrie likes, she and Ian will go and dig some up for him. Bryan always uses worms when he goes fishing.

  Ian suddenly says, ‘Whisht!’ and points to a ring in the water about twenty yards from the boat. He is obviously no tyro at the sport. We approach our prey, and Guthrie casts over the place with great skill. A large fish rises and looks at the flies disdainfully, but utterly refuses to be caught. Betty reiterates her conviction that fish prefer worms.

  The morning passes without success. We learn from Ian that he is indeed the son of Donald, and that he intends to become a ghillie. Guthrie suggests the navy as a more suitable profession, but Ian is not attracted by the idea and says he would not like to be spending his whole time climbing masts; it would be an easier thing to be tracking the deer upon the mountains – so it would.

  After some time spent in flogging the water without any result, even Guthrie has to admit that it seems pretty useless, and we return home with an empty bag. We are walking back to the house somewhat disconsolately, when Betty suddenly turns to me and asks with her usual directness, ‘What is the use of fishing, Mummie?’

  I am slightly taken aback, but reply, after a moment’s thought, that it is to catch fish, of course.

  ‘I’m sure I could invent a better way,’ she says. ‘I would make a little trap for them with flies inside – if they really like flies, though I think they like worms better – and then, when they were all inside eating the flies – or worms –the trapdoor would shut, and there they’d be.’

  Guthrie says bitterly that after this morning’s so-called sport he is inclined to agree with Betty.

  Betty says, after reflection, that she likes damming burns much better than fishing.

  – Th
e afternoon is spent doing the flowers a task which is made more difficult for me by Mrs. Loudon, whose ideas on floral decorations have already been chronicled. We also write out the menu cards, and arrange how everyone is to sit at table.

  ‘I wonder what like that Baker man will be?’ says Mrs. Loudon. ‘I’ll have to have him on my left, and I’ll put you next to him, so mind and talk to the creature, Hester, and you can have Major Morley on the other side to make up.’

  ‘What good will that be if I can’t talk to him?’ I enquire innocently.

  ‘You know what I mean well enough,’ she replies. ‘You’re getting too uppish altogether, and if there’s any more of it I’ll pack you off home. Now where will we put Miss MacArbin?’

  Our deliberations are interrupted by the arrival of the post, and I am overjoyed to receive a letter from Tim. He has written before, of course, but only miserable, scrappy communications to convey the news that he is well and very busy getting his company into trim. This letter looks more promising, and I have hopes that it may contain information about houses. Perhaps Tim has had time to visit some of the ‘desirable residences to let’, whose names I obtained from the agent at Biddington.

  ‘Away with you and read it in peace,’ says Mrs. Loudon suddenly, so I fly upstairs with it to digest it at my leisure.

  The letter begins with the announcement that Tim has been very busy with his company, but that he has found time to examine some of the pigsties on the agent’s list, and most of them are absolutely foul. There is only one he likes the look of it is called ‘Heathery Hill’, on account of one small piece of heather which is dragging out an exiled existence in the rockery. I perceive at once that the charm of ‘Heathery Hill’ consists in the fact that there is a stable at the back which Tim can use for his charger, and I have grave doubts whether Tim has looked at any of its other amenities.

  The beds, the furniture, the kitchen range, and water supply, the condition of the roof, and the drains are completely ignored in Tim’s description. He touches lightly on the fact that the drawing room has a southern aspect, and the existence of a cupboard under the stairs, and asks me to wire at once whether or not he is to take it, as there are several other people after it. This threat does not disturb me, as agents invariably try to hustle prospective tenants in this manner, but I hastily scan the remainder of Tim’s letter in the hope that I may gather a few more crumbs of information anent my future home. Alas, there are no crumbs! The rest of the letter deals exclusively with a description of his charger, whom he has named Boanerges on account of his dark colour and rolling eye. Tim hopes that I approve of the name. Boanerges is absolutely the pick of the officers’ mounts, but not up to the colonel’s weight, of course, and old MacPherson likes something quieter. He is very comfortable to ride, and has excellent paces. Boanerges seems such an admirable steed that I can’t help wondering why he has been relegated to the junior major of the battalion perhaps the postscript explains in some part the anomaly; it is added in pencil and is ominously brief ‘Have just discovered, rather unexpectedly, that Boanerges does not like his father.’