(e) that young Mr. Warbury had been caught red-handed spying on the railway and was to be deported. Origin: the station-master at Tidcombe Halt, who had found young Mr. Warbury travelling to Barchester with a very suspicious tin case which might have been a bomb if it hadn’t been film negatives. Young Mr. Warbury had refused to open it and produced his identity card, upon which the station-master had said he didn’t hold with them things and they didn’t prove nothing and hauled young Mr. Warbury out of his first-class smoking carriage and locked him into the porters’ room while he rang up the police, to whom young Mr. Warbury had been so rude, obstructing him in the execution of his duty and threatening actions at law, that his father had had to go and make a quite grovelling explanation and apology.
After two months of such delightful hopes and fears it was a distinct disappointment to everyone that the Warbury family all went to America and were not even torpedoed on the way over. When Geraldine heard that they were going she was afraid that she might mind, but to her great relief she found that she didn’t, which made her write several very long dull letters to Captain Fairweather about a trepanning case and a dislocated pelvis. Captain Fairweather rightly interpreted these letters as a proof of love and confidence and carried on with his military duties.
The second event, perhaps of less general interest, but deeply exciting to our immediate circle at South-bridge, was the publication of Miss Hampton’s new novel, Temptation at St. Anthony’s, which was chosen as the Anti-Sex Immorality Society Book of the Month in U.S.A., and the Daily Dustbin First Pick for April in England, besides having in a more intellectual daily a slashing review which sent its sales up by thousands.
Miss Hampton had wished to dedicate her book to Mr. and Mrs. Bissell, from whom, she said, she had learnt many interesting facts hitherto unknown to her, especially from Mrs. Bissell, whose studies in the psychology of educational establishments were as profound as her mind was innocent. But the Bissells, though immensely flattered by the idea, felt that such notoriety might be prejudicial to them in their profession, in which, they said, one must always consider the weaker members, so Miss Hampton dedicated it to All Brave Spirits who have been my Friends. The Bissells, whose social education had advanced by leaps and bounds during a winter’s association with Adelina Cottage, burst into a small sherry party to celebrate the event, particularly inviting Mrs. Morland as a literary light.
‘It is always,’ said Mrs. Morland, shaking hands warmly with Miss Hampton, ‘so difficult when you want to congratulate someone, because you are never sure if they want to be congratulated, but I can’t tell you how pleased I am about Temptation at St. Anthony’s. I haven’t exactly read it, but I’m just as pleased as if I had and of course I shall.’
‘I wouldn’t if I were you,’ said Miss Hampton. ‘Strongmeat. Not for people with your sensitive outlook.’
This surprised Mrs. Morland very much, for though she knew that she was no good at being coarse, she had never thought of herself as sensitive, having been for many years far too busy to consider such things.
‘No, no,’ continued Miss Hampton. ‘You and I needn’t read each other’s books. We write for Our Public, not for our friends. Mercenaries, you and I. Must say though we work for our pay.’
‘Well, that is a great relief,’ said Mrs. Morland, picking up her gloves which she had dropped, ‘because I never expect people—I mean real people—to read my books, and I must say I have never read any of yours, though I’m sure they’re frightfully good. It is funny about one’s friends. Sometimes one likes the book and not the friend and sometimes the friend and not the book; and sometimes both, or neither. You know George Knox, don’t you, who lives near me at High Rising? I am very fond of him and I admire his books though one would never guess they were the same person. But with Mrs. Rivers I feel exactly the opposite, not that she is a friend, because I only met her once, years ago, at a lunch party. I don’t mean that I admire her and am fond of her books, which would be the exact opposite; but I find them both very unsympathetic. Then there is Mrs. Barton whose books about Borgias and things are entrancing, but somehow we’ve never quite hit it off. And I do really like you so much, but I know I wouldn’t like your books, so that is perfect.’
‘You’re a pretty good sort yourself,’ said Miss Hampton, giving her tie a jerk. ‘You had some kind of Book of the Month once, hadn’t you?’
‘I couldn’t really help it,’ said Mrs. Morland apologetically, ‘and it pleased my publisher frightfully. I call it my Child of Shame.’
At this simple piece of wit Miss Hampton laughed uproariously and said she wished she had thought of that.
‘I’ll give it you,’ said Mrs. Morland. ‘I haven’t used it much.’
Mrs. Phelps, who had been listening with deep interest, said she simply couldn’t understand how people could write books, but she was always telling Irons he ought to write his life, as he had been pretty well everywhere. She had, she said, found a splendid title for him: Irons in the Fire, because his friends called him Irons and the Fire part would mean partly that he had been under fire and partly that he had a lot of irons in the fire in every sense of the word.
Mrs. Morland and Miss Hampton, who had a pretty good idea of what the book would be like, looked at each other with eyes of despair and said in a jumble of simultaneous speech that it would be perfectly splendid. The Admiral, pleased though modest, said he was only a rough sailor and all his diaries were lost in that fire at the Pantechnicon while he was at Simonstown, but he would like to try his hand at it.
‘You ought to collaborate with Bent, Admiral,’ said Miss Hampton. ‘Tell him your idea, Bent.’
‘You know I make a special study of Vice, Admiral,’ said Miss Bent.
Miss Phelps said Father was a Rear-Admiral.
‘Tut, tut,’ said Miss Bent, to the great admiration of her audience, who had never known those words used outside a printed book before. ‘Vice. Unnatural Vice. Now, Admiral, I would like to pick your brains about the lower deck.’
This reasonable and scientific request frightened the Admiral so much that only the intervention of Mrs. Bissell kept him from summoning his wife and daughter and going home at once.
‘Pardon me, Miss Bent,’ said Mrs. Bissell, ‘but you have the stick by quite the wrong end as the saying is. It would be quite useless to ask Admiral Phelps, because his protective or escapist complex would not allow him to open his eyes to social evil. You would do much better to read the chapter on the Libido-Involuntary in A Concept of Neo-Phallic Thought by Spurge-Mack-worth. He used to lecture at the Training College and is a lucid and courageous thinker.’
‘It’s very good of you,’ said Miss Bent, who was sincerely fond of Mrs. Bissell, ‘but you know my motto: One Crowded Hour of Glorious Vice. The Admiral could tell me more in ten minutes than your friend could in ten books.’
But the Admiral could bear it no longer and took his wife and daughter away to meet some young naval friends who were arriving by the 6.40.
‘It’s a pity,’ said Miss Bent sadly. ‘When I think of the side lights you and Mr. Bissell have given us on school psychology— —’
‘But you must remember, Miss Bent,’ said Mr. Bissell, ‘that Mrs. Bissell has made a study of psychology. Of course she can’t write fiction like you ladies, though I often say to her, You never know till you’ve tried, but her knowledge of the subject is very thorough. I assure you the County Libery simply cannot keep pace with the books she asks for. In Febuary alone she had out seventeen books, didn’t you, Mother?’
‘Mr. Bissell has omitted to state,’ sa Midrs. Bissell, looking affectionately at her husband, ‘that two of them were for Mrs. Dingle. Her husband is apt to be troublesome, and I thought she might get some help.’
‘What kind of psychology did you get for her?’ asked Mrs. Morland with much interest.
‘Oh, not psychology,’ said Mrs. Bissell pityingly. ‘That would be quite useless without previous training. I got her a book on curi
ng alcoholism without the patient’s knowledge and another one on elementary ju-jitsu. She is a well-developed woman in intelligence and physique and I gather their home life has been quite a different thing.’
Mrs. Morland then said good-bye, leaving Miss Hampton and Miss Bent to make a night of it with the Bissells, which they did till nearly half-past eight, when Miss Bent said they ought to go down to the Red Lion and see who was there, so she and Miss Hampton departed, with Mannerheim in tow.
As April came on, life altered a little. Oxford came down and Mrs. Morland left the Birketts for her own house at High Rising. By an amicable arrangement her publisher’s wife Sibyl Coates had transferred herself and her nurse and children to her grandmother at Bournemouth for the Easter Vacation, so that Mrs. Morland would have her youngest son Tony at home with her. Mrs. Morland’s new book of short stories came out and all the reviewers said ‘Another vintage Morland,’ or ‘Mrs. Morland can be relied upon to give her readers exactly what they expect, and in her new book has given them generous measure, pressed down and overflowing,’ or ‘A laugh and a thrill on every page.’ Mrs. Morland, who never read press notices, was pleased to get her advance on royalties and felt that Tony’s education and the pocket money of her other boys were safe for the present. Her books made no great noise, but her publisher Adrian Coates rejoiced in their steady sale and had the great pleasure of finding out, through underground channels, that a loudly boomed novel called My Burning Flesh, translated from the Mixo-Lydian by a young woman on the staff of the Daily Dustbin, and described by his friends and rival publishers, Johns and Fairfield, as a stark and gripping piece of realism, had only sold half as many copies as Mrs. Morland’s.
Various people in Southbridge, and indeed all over England, were embarrassed by parcels of food from friends or relations in Canada, Australia, the United States, Kenya and other more or less English-speaking countries. While deeply grateful for the kindness that prompted the dispatch of such parcels to a starvation-haunted England, they were much annoyed by the excessive duty they had to pay, and in several cases wrote to The Times, whose défaitiste attitude towards the Crossword had by now alienated many of its staunchest supporters.
Miss Hampton and Miss Bent had the first serious difference of opinion in a companionship which had lasted for some twenty years. The cause of this rift was the invasion of two small and defenceless northern kingdoms, which were thus automatically added to their list of gallant little nations. Not that they differed by a hairsbreadth in their hatred and condemnation of the invaders, but the question of moral support from Mannerheim drove them into separate camps. On the chief premise, namely that there was nobody one had ever heard of in Norway or Denmark except Hans Andersen, they were united, but Miss Bent, less impetuous than Miss Hampton, insisted that Norway’s claims should be further examined, and to that end took the temporary Mannerheim round to the Bissells one Saturday morning, followed by the protesting Miss Hampton.
Mr. and Mrs. Bissell, always delighted by an intellectual discussion, were quickly put in possession of the facts and brought their minds to bear on the question.
‘I quite see what you mean about Norway,’ said Mr. Bissell. ‘One might of course mention Nansen.’
‘No!’ said Miss Bent, quite violently. ‘Look at the trouble the League of Nations has got us into. Besides, Nansen is no name for a dog.’
With such conviction did she speak that all her hearers felt that if they called a dog Nansen she would hate it.
‘Of course there is Longfellow,’ said Mrs. Bissell.
‘Long Tooth, you mean,’ said Miss Bent.
‘No; Longfellow,’ said Mrs. Bissell, placidly. ‘His beautiful rendering of that fine old saga about King Olaf. I learned many a canto of it by heart when I was a girl, and I used to teach it to the girls in the Fourth Standard.
“Einar then the arrow taking from the loosened string, Answered: That is Norway breaking ’neath thy hand, O King!” ’
This quotation was felt by her audience to be vaguely and uncomfortably too near the present state of things and a depressed silence fell, broken by Mr. Bissell, who said:
‘Hayken.’
‘Harken, Daddy,’ said Mrs. Bissell.
‘Hawkon, I think,’ said Miss Hampton.
Miss Bent said she knew one pronounced it Marter-linck, but that was perhaps different.
‘Call him Haakon if you like, Bent,’ said Miss Hampton, going rather white and sounding suspiciously as if she were going to cry. ‘You know I only want to please you.’
At this sudden collapse of Miss Hampton, whom her friends had always taken for the strong and gentlemanly spirit of the pair, the Bissells stood amazed. Mr. Bissell wished he were safely in the Masters’ Common Room, but Mrs. Bissell, a psychologist first and foremost, quickly recovered her poise and looked on with kind detachment at this interesting practical demonstration of all she had learnt in theory, and suggested a nice cup of tea. Miss Hampton and Miss Bent suddenly knew, as Aurora Freemantle had once discovered, that a nice cup of tea was the one thing in the world worth while, and though the Red Lion had been gaping for them for the last half-hour, they were glad to accept Mrs. Bissell’s offer. Miss Hampton blew her nose violently, Miss Bent said ‘Sorry’ in a gruff voice, and after a great deal more discussion, on the most amicable terms, it was decided that pending further political moves Mannerheim should be called Andersen, Mrs. Bissell pointing out with her usual excellent common sense that he would probably not hear the difference between the two names and so answer to his new name more readily.
The ladies then left, happy and reconciled. As they walked down Maria’s little front path a car drove past.
‘There’s Lydia Keith,’ said Miss Hampton. ‘Nice girl. She looks thin lately. Wonder if anything’s wrong.’
‘Miss Keith is a very peculiar and I might say almost abnormal type,’ said Mrs. Bissell.
‘How?’ said Miss Bent, hoping that Lydia might afford her some side lights on Vice.
‘She is perfectly normal,’ said Mrs. Bissell. ‘Goodbye, Miss Bent. Good-bye, Miss Hampton. Good-bye Andersen, old fellow.’
Now that the days were longer, or as the Dean said, the hours of daylight were perhaps a more correct expression, Mrs. Crawley decided to give a dinner party, nominally in honour of a retired Colonial Bishop who was going to do locum work in Little Misfit whose vicar, Mr. Tompion, had managed to get abroad as a Chaplain with the Barsetshires, but really because she felt that she would die unless she for once got into proper evening dress and knew that many of her friends shared her feelings. It was to be a slap-up party of eighteen, with all the leaves but one put into the dining-room table, which when fully extended could take twenty-four, but Mrs. Crawley made a concession to the troubled times by inviting people who were either staying in Barchester or could come in the same car and save petrol. Under the first heading were the retired Bishop, who was staying at the Deanery till the Vicarage at Little Misfit was ready, Noel Merton who was again down for a night’s leave and Miss Pettinger who of course lived near the High School in a charming Georgian house which was far too good for her. Under the second were Mrs. Brandon, Delia Brandon, and the Millers from Pomfret Madrigal who were coming with Sir Edmund Pridham in his car, and the Archdeacon from Plumstead and his daughter who would pick up the Birketts on their way. Mr. and Mrs. Keith had been asked, but Mrs. Keith was not well enough to come, so Mrs. Crawley had asked Lydia instead, knowing that Noel would be pleased to see her.
The party from Pomfret Madrigal were the first to arrive. Mrs. Brandon with a charming and quite illusory air of fragility wafted herself into the drawing-room in a chiffon cloud of every soft colour of sweet pea, followed by Mrs. Miller in a dark blue lace dress with a dark blue velvet jacket and Delia in green.
The Colonial Bishop was introduced to Mrs. Brandon and being unmarried at once felt thankful that Little Misfit and Pomfret Madrigal were only three miles apart. True, petrol was rationed, but he was a confirmed bicycli
st, having covered on that exhausting machine many hundred miles of his sub-Equatorial diocese where he was known to his flock as Mbanga Ngango, or roughly in English Roly-poly Witch Doctor.
‘I am delighted to hear that you are coming to Little Misfit,’ said Mrs. Brandon. ‘Mr. Tompion is quite delightful and so is his wife, but of course as he is an Army Chaplain he is not there.’
The Colonial Bishop, by now almost demented with admiration, said No, of course, one could quite see that.
‘And his wife, who is very nice indeed,’ Mrs. Brandon continued, looking pensively at her left hand on which shone the diamond ring, legacy of her husband’s rich aunt Miss Brandon, ‘has gone back to Leamington for the duration to her parents who are a very charming retired Colonel and his wife called Parkinson. I wished she could have stayed on at the Vicarage because she is splendid with children owing to having none of her own and was such a help with my nursery, but with you coming I suppose she couldn’t.’
The Colonial Bishop longed to explain to Mrs. Brandon that though a joint household of Mrs. Tompion and himself might have presented difficulties Mrs. Tompion would have been scrupulously respected by him; but finding this not easy to put into words, he asked if Mrs. Brandon had a large family.
‘Only two,’ said Mrs. Brandon, with an exquisitely melancholy inflection as of a Niobe to whom Apollo had spared the last of her brood.
‘But luckily in the nursery,’ said the Colonial Bishop, glad that his new friend was not likely to suffer through her children.
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