Miss Buncle Married

by D. E. Stevenson

  The Rasts quarreled with each other, they were cruel and disagreeable to each other, but they were as one in their hatred of Barbara. She felt their hatred like a solid thing, weighing upon her shoulders. She was their common enemy. They waited upon her, and carried out her orders with exactness and promptitude, but, for all that, she could feel the hatred seeping out of them at every pore. Several times she had tried saying to Arthur, “The Rasts hate me, you know,” and Arthur, usually so understanding, had not understood at all. He had either said, “Nonsense! Nobody could possibly hate you, you’re not a hateable person, Barbara,” or else he had said, “They’ve got more to do, with a lady in the house, but they’ll soon get used to it,” and another time he had said, “I don’t know why you keep on saying they hate you. They do their work all right, don’t they? Well then, what more do you want?” Barbara was constitutionally incapable of describing what she wanted. She struggled for a few moments, and then said, “I wish they’d smile sometimes,” whereupon Arthur had roared with laughter and exclaimed, “Can you imagine old Rast smiling? It would split his face. Honestly, Barbara, you would have difficulty in replacing the Rasts—look at the bother other people have with servants.”

  This particular morning Mrs. Rast looked more than usually sour. She listened in silence while Barbara arranged the meals for the weekend, and at last she announced that she would like to speak to Mrs. Abbott for a moment.

  Barbara was terrified, but she managed to convey her willingness to listen to Mrs. Rast.

  “There ’ave bin roomours,” said Mrs. Rast darkly, “I’m not one to listen to roomours, not as a general rule, but when they affects yourself they ’as to be listened to.”

  “Rumors?” inquired Barbara.

  “Roomours,” agreed Mrs. Rast. “It ’as bin said at table in Rast’s ’earing that you are looking for another ’ouse.”

  “Yes, of course we are.”

  “It seems to Rast and me that we ought to ’ave bin told,” said Mrs. Rast indignantly. “Me and Rast feels after the years we ’ave bin with Mr. Abbott, and given every satisfaction, not to say working our fingers to the bone, we ought to ’ave bin told.”

  “I thought everyone knew I was looking for a house,” said Barbara in surprise. “What did you think I was doing?”

  “What you do isn’t nothing to do with us, madame,” replied the unpleasant woman frigidly.

  “And anyhow, I haven’t found anything yet,” Barbara added.

  “It’s unsettling,” Mrs. Rast said. “Very unsettling, that’s what it is. Me and Rast ’asn’t felt so unsettled for years. When you think of all the years me and Rast ’as served Mr. Abbott it’s very unsettling to find you aren’t trusted.”

  Barbara felt sure there must be a good answer to this, but she couldn’t find it. She felt, deep within her, that it was unfair. The Rasts had known all along that she was looking for a house—it was a ramp, that was what it was—she felt her anger rising.

  “Not trusted,” Mrs. Rast continued. “That’s what’s worrying Rast and me.”

  “I’ll tell you when I find a house,” Barbara said.

  “And may I ask where the new ’ouse will be?” inquired Mrs. Rast with elaborate humility.

  “I don’t know. I haven’t found it yet.”

  “It will not be in this neighbor’ood, I presoome.”

  “No—no, it certainly won’t be here,” said Barbara firmly—the whole object of the move would be annulled if they did not move far enough away.

  Mrs. Rast drew back her head and tucked in her chin, it was an ugly gesture, rather like the recoil of a snake before it strikes—“I see,” she said. “Well, Rast and me feels that we would rather not leave the neighbor’ood. It suits us, and we ’ave our friends ’ere—we ’ave ties in this neighbor’ood.”

  “You mean…” Barbara could not believe her ears. “You mean you want to leave?”

  “I mean we don’t want to leave,” said Mrs. Rast significantly, “and what’s more, if Mr. Abbott was aware that Rast and me was wedded to the neighbor’ood—so to speak—well, we ’ave bin with Mr. Abbott a long time—we knows ’is ways, you see.”

  Barbara did see. It was the most frightful impertinence. She and Arthur were to remain at Sunnydene to suit the Rasts. Whatever next? she thought. She was angry, but she was also frightened—how would Arthur see it? Arthur was already a trifle lukewarm about leaving Sunnydene. She saw the doors of the cage closing and she thought, I shall be here forever and ever, growing old, playing bridge, waited upon by the Rasts. I must be strong, she thought, I must be firm. I’m too Barbara Buncle-ish, that’s what’s the matter with me. And then quite suddenly her rage rose to the surface, and she wasn’t frightened anymore.

  “Mrs. Rast,” she said, getting up out of the chair, and frowning at Mrs. Rast in a majestic manner. “Mrs. Rast, I consider your remarks impertinent. I shall be glad if you and your husband will look for another situation at the end of the month.”

  Mrs. Rast was aghast—as anybody well might have been—at the metamorphosis she was witnessing. It was like seeing a sheep turn into a tiger before your eyes. She did not recover the use of her tongue until her mistress had left the kitchen.

  Arthur had not yet gone to play golf. He was waiting in the hall for John Hutson to call for him (practicing a little putting on the hall carpet) when Barbara, still simmering with rage, emerged from the kitchen premises.

  “There you are, Arthur,” she remarked, with forced brightness. “Hasn’t Mr. Hutson called for you yet?”

  “No,” said Arthur, putting assiduously.

  “The Rasts are leaving,” added Barbara casually.

  “The Rasts—leaving?” exclaimed Arthur, with alarm and consternation. “Good heavens! How frightful! What’s the matter? Do they want more wages or something? Couldn’t you persuade—”

  “They don’t want to leave Hampstead Heath,” Barbara told him.

  Arthur’s face cleared, “Oh,” he said, “Oh well—there’s no real need for us to go, is there? I mean—well—there’s no real need. I was just thinking this morning—besides, you haven’t found a house yet. Did you explain?”

  “I told her we hadn’t fixed on a house,” Barbara admitted, she was still boiling with rage, but the rage was well in hand (it was a servant not a master). She thought, Arthur’s in a groove—he shall move.

  “Oh, well!” Arthur said, oblivious of the hidden storm. “Oh well! That’s all right then.”

  “Are you going to stay on here?” inquired Barbara.

  “What d’you mean?” cried Arthur, suddenly aghast.

  “I’m leaving here, you see,” Barbara explained calmly. “But, of course, you needn’t—”

  “Barbara! Barbara, of course, I didn’t mean I wanted to stay here—no, of course not.”

  “You must have meant something.”

  “No, nothing. Nothing at all,” said Arthur earnestly. “Of course I’m as keen as ever to find a house—as keen as ever.”

  “If you’d rather stay—”

  “No, no—certainly not. We must move—”

  “You see, I’ve half left here already,” Barbara explained, waving her hand vaguely. “It’s a funny sort of feeling—I’ve left here, but I haven’t gone anywhere else. I’m sort of in the air. But I couldn’t possibly come back here and settle down again—I simply couldn’t.”

  “Barbara, don’t be absurd. We’re going to move, I tell you.” He was thoroughly alarmed now; it was so unlike Barbara to behave like this—could she be ill, he wondered—ghastly thought! What on earth would happen if Barbara took ill?

  He was moved by his guardian angel to do the right thing, the only thing in the utterly unprecedented circumstances. He seized her in his arms and kissed her thoroughly—he had had eleven months’ experience in kissing Barbara, and he was r
ather good at the job. “There,” he said, “there—it’s all right, darling, isn’t it?”

  Much to his relief, Barbara responded adequately. “Of course, it’s all right, silly,” she replied, kissing him in return.

  They were still locked in each other’s arms, when Mr. Hutson opened the front door and walked in—he was a privileged visitor.

  “Are you ready, Arthur? Oh Lord, I’m sorry!” he exclaimed, trying to back out again.

  They drew apart, full of confusion.

  “We were just—er—saying good-bye,” said Barbara blushing furiously.

  “Barbara’s going to Wandlebury—she’s going to look at a house, you know,” added Arthur, babbling with embarrassment. “We’re leaving here tomorrow—or the next day. I told you we were leaving, didn’t I? I mean you’ve heard me say we were leaving here—”

  “Yes, of course. Everybody knows you’re leaving,” agreed John Hutson. “But surely you’re not going tomorrow—it’s Sunday, you know.”

  “Well, perhaps not exactly tomorrow, but quite soon—quite, quite soon,” Arthur assured him, “quite, quite soon—just as soon as ever we can—as soon as Barbara finds a house for us to move into. It was my idea to leave here, you know—I’ve told you that, haven’t I? My idea entirely—yes—I can’t bear this place—can’t think how I’ve stuck it so long.”

  “It’s not a bad place,” ventured Mr. Hutson—a trifle bewildered by his friend’s vehemence.

  “Oh, it is,” Arthur told him earnestly. “It’s a bad place—not a good place at all. Barbara and I are leaving immediately.”

  They walked down the path, Arthur still assuring his friend of the imminence of their departure. Mr. Hutson’s small car was waiting at the gate. Mr. Hutson got in and started the engine. Mr. Abbott stowed his clubs into the tonneau.

  “I say,” he said, hesitating with his foot on the step. “I say, John, I think I had better run back for a moment and say good-bye to Barbara—you don’t mind waiting a moment, do you?”

  “I thought you said good-bye to her!” exclaimed Mr. Hutson in amazement.

  “Not properly,” Arthur told him seriously. “I think I had better say good-bye to her properly.”

  He ran back to the house and disappeared from view.

  “So that’s marriage!” said Mr. Hutson to himself. “Most extraordinary!”

  Chapter Four

  Wandlebury

  English towns and villages have as many idiosyncrasies as prima donnas. Some of them hide themselves among woods, or lurk behind hills, to burst into the motorist’s view as the road winds round a corner; others are set upon a hilltop, their roofs and spires stretching heavenward for all the world to see. Others, again, lie upon a plain, so that the traveler sees them before him for miles, growing gradually bigger, changing from a toy village to a real one as he approaches. Some indulge in outlying suburbs of villas and bungalows, very new and tidy; others in long rows of workmen’s cottages with children playing round the doors.

  Barbara approached Wandlebury from the north, she had lost her way, and had been misdirected by a congenital idiot in charge of two ancient farm carts full of manure. She had wandered helplessly into muddy lanes, and had nearly bogged the car in trying to turn at a field gate—turning was still a troublesome and somewhat exhausting business for Barbara Abbott. She had begun to wonder whether Wandlebury had walked away in the night, leaving the countryside unblotted by its tenancy. For miles she had expected to see the place at every turn in the road; for miles she had said to herself, “I’m almost there—that next corner will disclose it to me.” If the country had not been so beautiful she would have been annoyed, she might even have given up the chase and gone home in despair, but the country was beautiful—not flat, nor exactly hilly, but rolling as English country ought to be. The day was bright and breezy, cloud shadows moved over the fields like smoke, and, like smoke, they faded and disappeared. A haze of tender green was spread upon the fields, as the seeds, which had lain dormant for so long, thrust forth their green blades to the warmth of the sun. Barbara could not be annoyed—it was not in her to be annoyed on such a day, and in such surroundings. Besides, she was distinctly above herself today. She had won a battle—a pitched battle against the forces of evil, and she had “managed” Arthur beautifully. I’m coming on, she thought.

  At this moment, a moment of psychological importance in Barbara’s development, she turned the corner of a high wall and found herself in the middle of a town—it was Wandlebury, at last, and Wandlebury just when she had ceased to expect it. There was no gradual approach to the place, no hideous growths of brick and plaster to be penetrated before the core of the town was reached—one moment Barbara had been in the country, the real country of hedges and fields and trees, and the next moment she was in the town.

  It was a very small town, of course—a sleepy, sunshiny place that looked as if the rush and hurry of the modern world had overlooked its existence. Barbara found herself in a big square, paved with cobbles. There was a fountain in the middle; the water from the fountain flowed away in a wide runnel: it made a pretty whispering sound. A few pigeons, their iridescent feathers gleaming in the sunshine, strutted about, pecking hopefully among the cobbles, or sat and preened themselves on the edge of the wide shallow basin of the fountain. One side of the square was occupied by County Buildings of Georgian character. They were four stories high with pediments over the principal windows and a heavily ornamented cornice along the edge of the flat roof. High pillars of Doric design graced the broad doorstep, supporting two small balconies with carved stone balustrades. Between the balconies an arched window lent a pleasing dignity to the design, and broke the monotony of the long line of tall windows whose large panes glittered in the morning sunshine. The whole effect of the buildings was bold, and simple, and massive.

  The second side of the square consisted of a row of private houses, which had been turned into offices and banks. They matched the County Buildings in period and design, were flat faced and pillared, with little flights of wide steps leading up to porticoed doorways. On the third side was a row of shops, and on the fourth, the Inn.

  The Inn, which bore the intriguing sign of The Apollo and Boot, was the oldest building in the square; it was pure Elizabethan, with small windows, timbered orders, and a gabled roof. The archway, which admitted travelers to the inn yard, was high and pointed, and above the archway was a row of latticed windows with diamond-shaped panes. Barbara felt, as she looked at the Inn, that the sound of the coach wheels of a previous century had not died away. She could so easily imagine the coaches, dashing round the corner, lurching in through the tall archway, and drawing up with a clatter of hoofs on the cobbled yard. She could imagine the horn blowing, the ostlers running out to change the horses, and the quaintly dressed passengers climbing down from the top of the coach with stiff and weary limbs. Mr. Pickwick, she thought, and Weller—yes, Sam Weller, that was his name—and the long lanky Mr. Winkle who fought in the duel. It’s all exactly like that, she thought (trying to catch the aroma of the book, the bird’s-eye view which we reproduce when we try to remember something read long ago and build up from an incident or a character in the story). It’s all exactly like the background of Pickwick Papers. How Arthur will love it, she thought, and her heart warmed toward him, for she was desperately fond of Arthur. The recollection of the little scene this morning made her smile—but her eyes were a trifle wet. As if I would have gone away and left him! she thought tenderly, what an absurd darling he is! It was all just bluff on my part (at least I suppose it was; I didn’t really think it was bluff at the time) and how I ever found the courage to do it, beats me. But, after all, it was really for his own good. He was getting into such a dull groove, and I know he’ll be happy here—and so shall I. Already she was determined that the house she was going to look at was the right house. Wandlebury was the place she had been looking for—s
he knew it in her bones.

  Through the tall arch of The Apollo and Boot she drove her car, and was half ashamed of its insignificance and modernity in that ancient yard. She parked it carefully in one corner—there was nobody about—and went into the Coffee Room for lunch.

  The Coffee Room was disappointing; it was dark and rather dirty—somebody had tried to bring it up to date and had succeeded in spoiling the atmosphere without achieving his object. But Barbara did not notice the room; she sat by the window and looked out at the square, at the fountain and the pigeons, and the pale gray buildings, and, above them, the pale blue sky; and suddenly, as she looked, the square was invaded by a flock of sheep, driven by boys, who cried shrilly to each other, and waved their sticks; and a strong smell of disinfectant from the sheep’s hot bodies drifted up to her as she sat at the window, and caught her by the throat.

  But they didn’t use disinfectant in those days, said Barbara to herself—it was a sure proof that Wandlebury was really here in the twentieth century.

  Chapter Five

  Jubilee Port

  After Barbara had finished her lunch she set out on foot for the lawyer’s office, where she was to inquire about The Archway House. The waiter had told her that it was no distance—no distance at all—and Barbara felt she could sample the unique flavor of Wandlebury better on foot than awheel. She strolled across the square, looking about her with interest and enjoyment. The square was full of ghosts—or so it seemed to Barbara—jolly little ghosts out of Arthur’s set of Dickens. Little gentlemen with whiskers on their cheeks, clad in knee breeches, with tight-fitting blue coats and glossy boots; and ladies with poke bonnets and curls, the silken rustle of whose skirts blended with the whisper of the running water in the wide gutter. It was all the easier to see these ghosts because, apart from them, the square was empty. There were no cars, no pedestrians, no signs whatever of the modern inhabitants of the town. But to Barbara the square was not empty, nor deserted, and this was strange, because Barbara always said that she had no imagination at all. To Barbara “an imagination” was a definite thing; it was like a leg, or an arm, or an ear, and when she said she didn’t have “an imagination” she visualized herself as a sort of mental cripple, a person who had been born without the usual supply of assets. “I have no imagination,” she would say, sadly, and she would go on to explain that that was the reason she had had to put her neighbors into her books. It seemed unkind of them to be annoyed at finding themselves there. They really ought to have been sorry for her—it was not her fault that she had been born without “an imagination,” was it? This being the case, it was very strange, very strange indeed that she should have seen poke bonnets and whiskers in Wandlebury, and heard the rustle of silken petticoats in the deserted square.