by E. F. Benson
Mrs Quantock's mind resembled in its workings the manoeuvres of a moth distracted by the glory of several bright lights. It dashed at one, got slightly singed, and forgetting all about that, turned its attention to the second, and the third, taking headers into each in turn, without deciding which, on the whole, was the most enchanting of these luminaries. So, in order to curb the exuberance of these frenzied excursions, she got a half-sheet of paper, and noted down the alternatives that she must choose from.
(i) Shall I keep him entirely to myself?
(ii) Shall I run him for all he is worth, and leave out L.?
(iii) Shall I get G. on my side?
(iv) Shall I give L. and G. bits?
She paused a moment, and then, remembering that he had voluntarily helped her very pretty housemaid to make the beds that morning, saying that his business (like the Prince of Wales's) was to serve, she added:
(v) Shall I ask him to be my cook?
For a few seconds the brightness of her eager interest was dimmed as the unworthy suspicion occurred to her that perhaps the prettiness of her housemaid had something to do with his usefulness in the bedroom, but she instantly dismissed it. There was the bottle of brandy, too, which he had ordered from Rush's – when she had begged him to order anything he wanted and cause it to be put down to her account, she had not actually contemplated brandy… Then, remembering that one of the most necessary conditions for progress in Yoga was that the disciple should have complete confidence in the Guru, she chased that also out of her mind. But still, even when the lines of all possible policies were written down, she could come to no decision, and putting her paper by her bed, resolved to sleep over it. The rhythmical sounds of hallowed breathing came steadily from next door, and she murmured ‘Om, Om,’ in time with them.
The hours of the morning between breakfast and lunch were the times which the inhabitants of Riseholme chiefly devoted to spying on each other. They went about from shop to shop on household businesses, occasionally making purchases which they carried away with them in little paper parcels with convenient loops of string, but the real object of those excursions was to see what everybody else was doing, and learn what fresh interests had sprung up like mushrooms during the night. Georgie would be matching silks at the draper's, and very naturally he would carry them from the obscurity of the interior to the door, in order to be certain about the shades, and keep an eye on the comings and goings in the street, and very naturally Mr Lucas, on his way to the market-gardener's to inquire whether he had yet received the bulbs from Holland, would tell him that Lucia had received the piano-arrangement of the Mozart trio. Georgie, for his part, would mention that Hermy and Ursy were expected that evening, and Pepino, enriched by this item, would ‘toddle on’, as his phrase went, to meet and exchange confidences with the next spy. He had noticed incidentally that Georgie carried a small oblong box with hard corners, which, perfectly correctly, he conjectured to be cigarettes for Hermy and Ursy, since Georgie never smoked.
‘Well, I must be toddling on,’ he said, after identifying Georgie's box of cigarettes, and being rather puzzled by a bulge in Georgie's pocket. ‘You'll be looking in some time this morning, perhaps!’
Georgie had not been quite sure that he would (for he was very busy, owing to the arrival of his sisters, and the necessity of going to Mr Holroyd's, in order that that artist might accurately match the shade of his hair with a view to the expensive toupet), but the mention of the arrival of the Mozart trio decided him. He intended anyhow before he went home for lunch to stroll past The Hurst, and see if he did not hear – to adopt a mixed metaphor – the sound of the diligent practice of that classical morsel going on inside. Probably the soft pedal would be down, but he had marvellously acute hearing, and he would be very much surprised if he did not hear the recognizable chords, and even more surprised if, when they came to practise the piece together, Lucia did not give him to understand that she was reading it for the first time. He had already got a copy, and had practised his part last night, but then he was in the superior position of not having a husband who could inadvertently ‘tell on him’. Meantime, it was of the first importance to get that particular shade of purple that had none of that ‘tarsome’ magenta-tint in it. Meantime, also, it was of even greater importance to observe the movements of Riseholme.
Just opposite was the village green, and as nobody was quite close to him, Georgie put on his wire-rimmed spectacles, which he could whisk off in a moment. It was they which formed that bulge in his pocket which Pepino had noticed, but the fact of his using spectacles at all was a secret that would have to be profoundly kept for several years yet. But as there was no one at all near him, he stealthily adjusted them on his small straight nose. The morning train from town had evidently come in, for there was a bustle of cabs about the door of the Ambermere Arms, and a thing that thrilled him to the marrow was the fact that Lady Ambermere's motor was undoubtedly among them. That must surely mean that Lady Ambermere herself was here, for when poor thin Miss Lyall, her companion, came in to Riseholme to do shopping, or transact such business as the majestic life at The Hall required, she always came on foot, or, in very inclement weather, in a small two-wheeled cart like a hip-bath. At this moment, steeped in conjecture, who should appear, walking stiffly, with her nose in the air, as if suspecting, and not choosing to verify, some faint unpleasant odour, but Lady Ambermere herself, coming from the direction of The Hurst… Clearly she must have got there after Pepino had left, or he would surely have mentioned the fact that Lady Ambermere had been at The Hurst, if she had been at The Hurst. It is true that she was only coming from the direction of The Hurst, but Georgie practised, though he was not aware of, Darwin's proposition, that in order to observe usefully you must have a theory. Georgie's theory was that Lady Ambermere had been at The Hurst just for a minute or two, and hastily put his spectacles in his pocket. With the precision of a trained mind, he also formed the theory that some business had brought Lady Ambermere into Riseholme, and that taking advantage of her presence there, she had probably returned a verbal answer to Lucia's invitation to her garden-party, which she would have received by the first post this morning. He was quite ready to put his theory to the test when Lady Ambermere had arrived at the suitable distance for his conveniently observing her, and for taking off his hat. She always treated him like a boy, which he liked.
The usual salutations passed.
‘I don't know where my people are,’ said Lady Ambermere majestically. ‘Have you seen my motor?*’
‘Yes, dear lady; it's in – er – at your own Arms,’ said Georgie brightly. ‘Happy motor!’
If Lady Ambermere unbent to anybody, she unbent to Georgie. He was of quite good family, because his mother had been a Bartlett, and a second cousin of her deceased husband. Sometimes when she talked to Georgie she said ‘we’, implying thereby his connection with the aristocracy; this gratified Georgie nearly as much as did her treatment of him as being quite a boy still. It was to him as a boy still that she answered.
‘Well, the happy motor, you little rascal, must come to my arms instead of being at them,’ she said, with the quick wit for which Riseholme pronounced her famous. ‘Fancy being able to see my motor at that distance. Young eyes!’
It was really young spectacles, but Georgie did not mind that. In fact he would not have corrected the mistake for the world.
‘Shall I run across and fetch it for you?’ he asked.
‘In a minute. Whistle on your fingers like a vulgar street-boy,’ said Lady Ambermere. ‘I'm sure you know how to.’
Georgie had not the slightest idea, but with the courage of youth, he presumed (with the prudence of middle age) that he would not really be called upon to perform so unimaginable a feat, and put two fingers up to his mouth.
‘Here goes, then!’ he said, greatly daring. (He knew perfectly well that the dignity of Lady Ambermere would not permit rude, vulgar whistling, of which he was hopelessly incapable, to summon her motor.) She
made a feint of stopping her ears with her hands.
‘Don't do anything of the kind,’ she said. ‘In a minute you shall walk with me across to the Arms, but tell me this first. I have just been to say to our good Mrs Lucas that very likely I will look in at her garden-party on Friday, if I have nothing else to do. But who is this wonderful creature she is expecting? Is he an Indian conjuror? If so, I should like to see him, because when Ambermere was in Madras I remember one coming to the Residency who had cobras and that sort of thing. I told Mrs Lucas I didn't like snakes, and she said there shouldn't be any. In fact, it was all rather mysterious, and she didn't at present know if he was coming or not. I only said “No snakes! I insist on no snakes.”’
Georgie relieved her mind about the chance of there being snakes, and gave a short précis of the ascertained habits of the Guru, laying special stress on his high caste.
‘Yes, some of those Brahmins are of very decent family,’ Lady Ambermere. ‘I was always against lumping all dark-skinned people together and calling them niggers. When we were at Madras I was famed for my discrimination.’
They were walking across the green as Lady Ambermere gave vent to these liberal sentiments, and Georgie even without the need of his spectacles could see Pepino, who had spied Lady Ambermere from the door of the market-gardener's, hurrying down the street, in order to get a word with her before ‘her people’ drove her back to The Hall.
‘I came in to Riseholme to-day to get rooms at the Arms for Olga Bracely,’ she observed.
‘The prima-donna?’ asked George, breathless with excitement.
‘Yes, she is coming to stay at the Arms for two nights with Mr Shuttleworth.’
‘Surely –’ began Georgie.
‘No; it is all right; he is her husband; they were married last week,’ said Lady Ambermere. ‘I should have thought that Shuttleworth was a good enough name, as the Shuttleworths are cousins of the late lord, but she prefers to call herself Miss Bracely. I don't dispute her right to call herself what she pleases: far from it, though who the Bracelys were, I have never been able to discover. But when Charlie Shuttleworth wrote to me, saying that he and his wife were intending to stay here for a couple of days and proposing to come over to The Hall to see me, I thought I would just look in at the Arms myself, and see that they were promised proper accommodation. They will dine with me to-morrow. I have a few people staying, and no doubt Miss Bracely will sing afterwards. My Broadwood was always considered a remarkably fine instrument. It was very proper of Charlie Shuttleworth to say that he would be in the neighbourhood, and I daresay she is a very decent sort of woman.’
They had come to the motor by this time – the rich, the noble coach, as Mr Pepys would have described it – and there was poor Miss Lyall hung with parcels, and wearing a faint sycophantic smile. This miserable spinster, of age so obvious as to be called uncertain, was Lady Ambermere's companion, and shared with her the glories of The Hall, which had been left to Lady Ambermere for life. She was provided with food and lodging and the use of the cart like a hip-bath, when Lady Ambermere had errands for her to do in Riseholme, so what could a woman want more? In return for these bounties, her only duty was to devote herself body and mind to her patroness, to read the paper aloud, to set Lady Ambermere's patterns for needle-work, to carry the little Chinese dog under her arm, and wash him once a week, to accompany Lady Ambermere to church, and never to have a fire in her bedroom. She had a melancholy, wistful little face; her head was inclined with a backward slope on her neck, and her mouth was invariably a little open showing long front teeth, so that she looked rather like a roast hare sent up to table with its head on. Georgie always had a joke ready for Miss Lyall, of the sort that made her say: ‘Oh, Mr Pillson!’ and caused her to blush. She thought him remarkably pleasant.
Georgie had his joke ready on this occasion.
‘Why, here's Miss Lyall!’ he said. ‘And what has Miss Lyall been doing while Her Ladyship and I have been talking? Better not ask, perhaps.’
‘Oh, Mr Pillson!’ said Miss Lyall, as punctually as a cuckoo-clock when the hands point to the hour.
Lady Ambermere put half her weight on to the step of the motor, causing it to creak and sway.
‘Call on the Shuttleworths, Georgie,’ she said. ‘Say I told you to. Home!’
Miss Lyall effaced herself on the front seat of the motor, like a mouse hiding in a corner, after Lady Ambermere had got in, and the footman mounted the box. At that moment Pepino, with his bag of bulbs, squeezed his way, a little out of breath, between two cabs by the side of the motor. He was just too late, and the motor moved off. It was very improbable that Lady Ambermere saw him at all.
Georgie felt very much like a dog with a bone in his mouth, who only wants to get away from all the other dogs, and discuss it quietly. It is safe to say that never in twenty-four hours had so many exciting things happened to him. He had ordered a toupet, he had been looked on with favour by a Guru, all Riseholme knew that he had had quite a long conversation with Lady Ambermere, and nobody in Riseholme, except himself, knew that Olga Bracely was going to spend two nights here. Well he remembered her marvellous appearance last year at Covent Garden in the part of Brünnhilde. He had gone to town for a drastic but rejuvenating visit to his dentist, and the ‘tarsomeness’ of being betwixt and between had been quite forgotten by him when he saw her awake to Siegfried's kiss on the mountain-top. ‘Das ist keine Mann,’ Siegfried had said, and, to be sure, that was very clever of him, for she looked like some slim, beardless boy, and not in the least like those great fat fraus at Baireuth, whom nobody could have mistaken for a man as they bulged and heaved even before the strings of the breast-plate were cut by his sword. And then she sat up and hailed the sun, and Georgie felt for a moment that he had quite taken the wrong turn in life when he settled to spend his life in this boyish, maidenly manner with his embroidery and his china-dusting at Riseholme. He ought to have been Siegfried… He had bought a photograph of her in her cuirass and helmet, and often looked at it when he was not too busy with something else. He had even championed his goddess against Lucia, when she pronounced that Wagner was totally lacking in knowledge of dramatic effects. To be sure, she had never seen any Wagner opera, but she had heard the overture to Tristan performed at the Queen's Hall, and if that was Wagner, well –
Already, though Lady Ambermere's motor had not yet completely vanished up the street, Riseholme was gently closing in round him, in order to discover by discreet questions (as in the game of Clumps) what he and she had been talking about. There was Colonel Boucher with his two snorting bull-dogs closing in from one side, and Mrs Weston in her bath-chair being wheeled relentlessly towards him from another, and the two Misses Antrobus sitting playfully on the stocks on the third, and Pepino at close range on the fourth. Everyone knew, too, that he did not lunch till half-past one, and there was really no reason why he should not stop and chat as usual. But with the eye of the true general, he saw that he could most easily break the surrounding cordon by going off in the direction of Colonel Boucher, because Colonel Boucher always said: ‘Haw, hum,’ before he descended into coherent speech, and thus Georgie could forestall him with ‘Good-morning, Colonel,’ before he got to business. He did not like passing close to those slobbering bull-dogs, but something had to be done… Next moment he was clear, and saw that the other spies were still converging on each other, and following out his original scheme, he walked briskly down towards Lucia's house, to listen for any familiar noises out of Mozart's trio. There they were, and the soft pedal was down just as he expected, so, that business being off his mind, he continued his walk for a few hundred yards more, meaning to make a short circuit through fields, cross the bridge over the happy stream that flowed into the Avon, and regain his house by the door at the bottom of the garden. Then he would sit and think… the Guru, Olga Bracely… What if he asked Olga Bracely and her husband to dine, and persuaded Mrs Quantock to let the Guru come? That would be three men and one woman, and Hermy an
d Ursy would make all square. Six for dinner was the utmost that Foljambe permitted.
He had come to the stile that led into the fields, and sat there for a moment. Lucia's tentative melodies were still faintly audible, but even while he sat there they stopped, and he guessed that she was looking out of the window. She was too great to take part in the morning spying that went on round about the green, but she often saw a good deal from her window. He wondered what Mrs Quantock was meaning to do: apparently she had not promised the Guru for the garden-party, or else Lady Ambermere would not have said that Lucia did not know whether he was coming or not. Perhaps Mrs Quantock was going to run him herself, and grant him neither to the Queen nor Georgie… That was sheer Bolshevism, and at this giddy moment, Georgie felt that he had the making of a Bolshevist too. Lucia's yoke was heavy sometimes, and he daringly wondered what would happen if he asked Olga Bracely to dinner, without mentioning to Lucia that she would be here on the afternoon of the garden-party. Georgie was a Bartlett on his mother's side, and he played the piano better than Lucia, and he had twenty-four hours’ leisure every day, which he could devote to being King of Riseholme… His nature flared up, burning with a red revolutionary flame, that was fed by his secret knowledge about Olga Bracely. Why should Lucia rule everyone with her rod of iron? Why, and again, why?