by Ann Bridge
THE
NUMBERED
ACCOUNT
_______________
ANN BRIDGE
Contents
Chapter
1 Glentoran
2 Gersau
3 Bellardon
4 Geneva
5 Geneva—the Palais des Nations
6 Beatenberg and the Niederhorn
7 The Schynige Platte
8 Merligen
9 Interlaken—the Clinic and the Golden Bear
10 Interlaken—the Golden Bear and the Gemsbock
11 Beatenberg and Interlaken
12 The Passes
13 The Aares-Schlucht
14 Beatenberg
15 Interlaken—the Clinic
16 Interlaken—Bellardon
17 Bellardon—Berne
Chapter 1
Glentoran
The red-funnelled Flora Macdonald sidled skilfully alongside the grey wet quay of the small West Highland port, watched by Edina Reeder, who also scanned the passengers waiting above the gangway; when she saw among them a tall elegant figure with a tawny-gold head she smiled and waved. Presently a porter in a seaman’s jersey carried the luggage out and stowed it in a brandnew Land-Rover, while the two cousins kissed and exchanged greetings.
‘Philip and I thought you were never coming back to Glentoran,’ Mrs Reeder said. ‘You haven’t been up since our wedding, and that’s nearly two years ago.’
‘I know. I was such ages in Portugal—both times. But it’s heavenly to be back now.’ As the car shot off from the harbour—‘This is a terrific machine,’ Julia Probyn said. ‘Philip, I suppose?’
‘Oh yes, everything is Philip. You won’t know Glentoran!’ Edina replied. ‘When we got married Mother, in her most Early Christian Martyr way, suggested withdrawing to the little dower-house, but of course we didn’t allow that—she’s in the west wing. Philip has turned it into a self-contained flat, with a sub-flat for Forbes, horrid old creature! And we raked up Joanna—do you remember?—housemaid ages ago—to be cook; she makes just the sort of horrible food Mother likes, so it’s all perfect.’
‘I thought the west wing used to be damp,’ Julia said.
‘Ah, but not any more. Central heating throughout! I expect it’s very bad for one, softening, and all that—but I must say it’s exceedingly comfortable to be warm everywhere, after those awful wood fires. And Olimpia adores it, salamander that she is.’
‘Oh, you’ve still got Olimpia?’
‘Yes indeed. Between having a boiling hot bed-sitting-room, and Philip to talk Spanish to her every day, I think she’s settled for life—and of course her food is better than ever.’
‘It couldn’t be better —it was always divine.’
‘Well it still is; more divine. Colin’s here,’ Mrs. Reeder then said. ‘He was delighted when you rang up to say that you were coming, because he’s going off again fairly soon to the Middle East, or one of those troublesome places.’
‘Oh I am glad. What luck! Dear Colin.’ Miss Probyn was devoted to her other cousin, Edina Reeder’s young brother. ‘How is he?’
‘I fancy he’s got something on his mind,’ Edina said, slinging the Land-Rover round the curves of a steep hill under huge overhanging beeches, ‘but he hasn’t uttered. I daresay he’ll tell you.’ As they reached the top of the hill and emerged into open country—
‘Goodness! You’ve ploughed that slope above Lagganna-Geoich!’ Miss Probyn exclaimed. ‘It used to be all rushes. What can grow there?’
‘Winter wheat. It’s all been drained—with the government grant, of course—and fenced, as you see.’
Indeed as they now entered on the Glentoran estate, evidences of prosperity and good husbandry appeared on all sides: strong pig-wire fences, Dutch barns, new iron gates painted red; so different from the beloved but rather derelict Glentoran that she had known all her life that Julia fairly gasped. ‘I can’t think how you’ve got it all done in the time,’ she said, after being shown three or four silage-pits, and a herd of pedigree Ayrshire cows.
‘Oh, Philip works all day and most of the night, and adores it. But I must say it’s very nice to have some money to come and go on, and be able to treat the land properly. Wait till you see the hill-pastures, limed and re-seeded and all! Of course the subsidies don’t nearly cover it, one has to dip into one’s pocket all the time—but Philip says he’ll be able to bring out a terrific, and quite true, loss on the property for income-tax for this year and next.’
Julia laughed, and returned to the subject of her cousin Colin.
‘What makes you think he has something on his mind?’
‘He mopes, and jerks his thumb.’
Many of the Monro family had the hereditary peculiarity of double-jointed thumbs, enabling them to turn that member downwards in a spectacular and quite horrible fashion; the operation made an audible creaking sound which was curiously sickening. Edina used this peculiar gift sparingly, being a calm person; but Julia was intensely familiar with it in Colin Monro, as a symptom of nervousness or worry.
However, he showed no sign of either at luncheon, which took place rather late. In spite of all the external improvements, Glentoran within was its old shabby self, rather to Julia’s relief—except for the genial all-pervading warmth from the central heating, and a newly-installed fitted basin with scalding hot water in her bedroom. Clearly Philip Reeder believed in spending his good money on useful, practical things rather than on aesthetic amenities; the drawing-room, to which she presently went down, had its old worn and hideous carpet, and the familiar faded cretonne covers. Here Philip gave her a stiff gin, and here also she encountered Colin and old Mrs. Monro, his and Edina’s mother.
‘How nice to see you, Aunt Ellen,’ Julia said, kissing her, and holding out a casual hand to Colin.
‘I can’t think why you haven’t been near us for so long,’ Mrs. Monro said fretfully.
‘I’ve been abroad, you know.’
‘Everyone will go abroad—I can’t think why. Mary Hathaway has gone abroad, when she might just as well have been here,’ Mrs. Monro pursued, in a complaining tone. ‘She’s gone to Switzerland, of all places.’
‘To stay with an old flame,’ Edina put in. ‘Really old—about 80! He lives in Gersau, wherever that is.’
‘On the Lake of Lucerne,’ Colin said.
‘Oh, you know-all! Mother, if you’ve finished your sherry let’s go in, shall we? Julia, bring in your drink.’
Julia, instead, downed it. ‘I hate spirits at table.’
Over the meal Mrs. Monro resumed her grumbles.
‘I can’t think why Mary should have wanted to go to Switzerland. I went there once, and I thought it a most horrid place—all mountains, really there’s nowhere to walk on the flat. They took me into an ice-grotto, in some glacier, and it dripped down my neck. I think all that ice and snow about is most unhealthy.’
Philip Reeder, laughing, reminded his mother-in-law that large parts of Switzerland were far from any ice or snow, and really not much more mountainous than Argyll—round Lake Neuchâtel, for instance. Julia noticed a certain preoccupation in Colin’s expression while the talk was of Switzerland, which left it when they turned to discussing local affairs; presently he addressed her in Gaelic, still spoken here and there in the district; they had both picked it up as children from the keepers and the boatmen, and he gave his rather high-pitched giggle of pleasure when, after a second’s hesitation, she replied in the same archaic tongue. After that they talked in Gaelic across the table; this irritated old Mrs. Monro, who eventually protested—‘I was brought up to think it very ill-bred to talk in a language that others present cannot understand.’
‘They’re not ill-bred, Mother; they’
re merely good linguists,’ Edina told her mother. ‘So was father, he spoke Gaelic perfectly, the old people always tell me—“He had the Gahlic” is their phrase. You and I aren’t linguists, worse luck for us; if we were, we could have learnt it.’
‘My dear, I never wished to learn such a useless language,’ said old Mrs. Monro, with the complete finality of the rather stupid person.
After lunch Colin determinedly took Julia out to stroll in the garden; Philip went off to the farm and Edina, after returning her mother to the west-wing flat, settled down to some overdue correspondence about Girl Guides. Julia was struck afresh by what a little money—Philip’s money—was doing to Glentoran: the lawns close-mown; the strangling brambles cut down from the immense species rhododendrons (brought back as seeds by Hooker himself from the Himalayas) along the banks of the burn; all the deadly growth of sycamore seedlings cleared out from between the rare shrubs along the upper avenue.
‘Goodness, it is lovely to see this place being put to rights again,’ she said.
‘Yes, I suppose so.’ Colin sounded distrait, as though the improvement in what was really his own estate meant very little to him. Presently he stood still.
‘Julia’—he paused.
‘Yes?’
‘I know it’s none of my business, but I’m so fond of him that it worries me—’ he paused again, in obvious embarrassment.
‘Well?’ Julia asked, guessing what was coming.
‘Well, how do things stand between you and Hugh?’
‘They don’t stand at all,’ Julia said, quite unembarrassed. ‘He asked me to marry him in Portugal, and I said No.’
‘Why on earth? He’s such a splendid person.’
‘I just couldn’t feel it the right thing to do—somehow he didn’t seem the same in Portugal as he did in Tangier.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What I say—and more than that I won’t say, because I couldn’t explain properly. I’m sorry about it, very, but there it is.’
‘Don’t you think it’s about time you stopped amusing yourself with men, and then turning them down?’ Colin said crossly. ‘First it was that wretched Consett, though I admit he was a bit of a wet, and now it’s Hugh—who certainly isn’t wet.’
‘No, of course he isn’t,’ Julia said, with perfect good-temper. ‘But I can’t marry him because he’s your boss, and you’re fond of him. I must want badly to marry the person I do marry; it wouldn’t be fair to them, otherwise—in fact much more unfair than rubbing them off in good time.’
Colin laughed, rather unwillingly, at the flat way in which Julia brought out this piece of wisdom. Suddenly he gave her a kiss.
‘Oh well, you’re not actually a hag yet,’ he said, ‘even if you are rather a monster! I daresay you’ll find a man you badly want to marry one of these days. Don’t leave it too late, though.’
‘Try not to, darling,’ Julia said, returning his kiss.
Julia wondered after this conversation whether Colin’s gloom had been about her and Hugh Torrens, his chief in the Secret Service, and hoped that having said his piece, the young man might feel better. But he continued abstracted.
The whole party foregathered for tea in the diningroom, which, Julia observed with nostalgic satisfaction, was as gloomy, shabby, and ugly as ever—woodlice still crawled, and died, between the outer panes and the hideous stained glass which defaced the upper half of the windows; the log fire still spat and fizzled ineffectually—though, thanks to the central heating, this made no difference to anyone’s comfort. Half-way through the deleteriously ample Scottish meal of two kinds of scone, four different cakes, assorted jams and jellies and honey in the comb, the telephone rang. Philip Reeder had installed an extension in every sitting-room in the house, as well as in his own and Edina’s bedroom, instead of the single inconviently-placed instrument in the chilly cloak-room near the front door; he rose from the table and answered the call.
‘Telegram for you, Julia,’ he said, and held out the receiver.
Besides putting in all these telephones, that practical man Philip Reeder insisted that there should always be a writing-block and a pencil beside each machine—woe betide his wife if either were ever missing. Both pad and pencil were in place when Julia went over to the table under the woodlice-laden window; she listened, wrote down, questioned, scribbled again—finally she tore the top sheet off the block, and returned to the table.
‘So sorry, Edina. It’s from Mrs. H.’
‘Why does Mary Hathaway need to send you such a huge long telegram?’ old Mrs. Monro asked.
‘She’s ill, Aunt Ellen, and she wants Watkins to go out and look after her; she’s afraid of being a trouble to this old Mr. Waechter and his servants.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Philip Reeder said—he had soon come to share the Monro family’s affection for Mrs. Hathaway, always their prop and stay in any trouble. ‘What’s wrong with her?’
‘Congestion of the lungs.’
‘There! What did I say?’ old Mrs. Monro exclaimed triumphantly. ‘Switzerland is unhealthy. I expect poor Mary went into an ice-grotto!’
‘There are no glaciers within forty miles of Gersau, Mother,’ Colin put in.
‘Then I expect old Mr. Waechter, who I believe is extremely rich, drove her to one,’ his mother said obstinately. Philip put a more practical question to his guest.
‘Why does she wire to you, Julia? Can’t Watkins just take a ticket, and go?’
‘Oh no,’ his wife hastily told him. ‘Watkins can’t bear travelling abroad—that’s why Mrs. H. didn’t take her along. Julia, I suppose this means that you’ve got to drag that spoilt old creature out in person, doesn’t it? Oh what misery!—when you’ve only just come. I can’t think why anyone has a lady’s-maid!’
‘My dear, when they existed they were a great convenience,’ her husband told her—‘though this Watkins person sounds rather an unsuitable type, I must say.’
‘Watkins has been with Mary Hathaway for twentyfive years, Philip,’ his mother-in-law pronounced—‘and she is a most faithful and excellent servant.’
‘Well, have you got to go out and take her, Julia?’ Colin asked—rather to his cousin’s surprise.
‘Yes, I’m afraid I must do just that,’ Julia said. ‘Edina, I am so sorry. Philip, may I send a telegram? I ought to do it after tea.’
‘Of course. But send it N.L.T., at half the day price,’ her host said, with his usual practicality.
‘Fine. I must wire to old Watkins too, and tell her to pack her traps and be ready to start when I come. Oh yes, and I must book a flight from Renfrew. What a bore! I was so happy to be up here again!’
‘I suppose you’ll fly?’ her host said. ‘Shouldn’t you book plane seats to Switzerland too?’
‘Oh no; Watkins will never fly—we must go by train. Yes, of course we must get sleepers.’
‘Where to?’ Reeder asked.
‘Berne,’ Colin pronounced suddenly. ‘You change there for Lucerne, and then take a steamer on to Gersau.’
‘How do you know all this?’ his sister asked him. The young man jerked his thumb out of joint as he replied—‘I just do know.’
‘Next assignment Switzerland?’ his brother-in-law asked. ‘Sounds as if you’d been mugging it up.’
‘It’s coming in very handy for me,’ Julia said, as Colin merely shook his head, frowning at this attempt at humour.
After tea much telephoning and sending of telegrams took place: a flight was booked from Renfrew for the following afternoon, Cook’s promised sleepers from Calais to Berne two days later; Julia just caught her bank manager and organised traveller’s cheques. During all this fuss Colin hung about, silent and preoccupied; when Julia said—‘Well, that’s that’—after talking to the bank, he put in a word.
‘What about Watkins’s passport?’
‘Oh Lord!—I never thought of that. I don’t for a moment suppose she’s got one. Will they be shut now? What are we to do? We sha
n’t have much time to rake up a Minister of Religion or a Justice of the Peace to vouch for her.’
‘I think I’d better ring up the office. They will probably be able to fix it.’
‘Could you? Would they?’ Julia said, immensely relieved. She was also happily surprised by Colin’s helpfulness.
‘I expect so. What’s her Christian name?’
‘No idea,’ and ‘May,’ Julia and Edina said simultaneously.
‘Just May? May Watkins? What a name for that old dragoon.’
‘Yes, May,’ Edina repeated firmly. ‘Her mother doted on old Queen Mary. Endless girls in Watkins’s generation were called after “Princess May”.’
‘All right—though it sounds pretty silly to me. Now you girls can clear out. I’ll tell you what happens.’
Julia and Edina obediently removed themselves; they sat on a new teak seat on the terrace, in the westering sun, looking out over the drifts of daffodils in the rough grass round the lawn, where the pink candles on the great horse-chestnut were just coming into flame—its lower boughs drooped down to the ground.
‘How funny that Colin should lend a hand like this,’ Edina said, ‘after being so sour when Philip ragged him about Switzerland.’
‘I was just thinking the same thing,’ Julia replied. ‘But anyhow, what a boon! That office of his can fix anything. Still, I do wonder what’s behind it—it isn’t a bit like him.’
A window was thrown up behind them.
‘Where shall May’s passport be sent?’ Colin’s voice enquired.
‘My flat. No, my club; of course the flat’s shut.’
‘That grisly place in Grosvenor Street?’
‘Yes.’ The window was slammed down again.
‘Good for him,’ Julia said.
Presently Colin appeared on the terrace.
‘All fixed, darling?’ Julia asked.
‘Yes, darling darling.’
This was another piece of youthful nonsense, dating from the long happy holiday summers when Colin was at Eton, and Julia at a finishing school in Paris; they used the word ‘darling’ then as a sort of call-note, like a bird’s special note of alarm, for any secret thing between them. This had irritated old Mrs. Monro even more than their speaking Gaelic at meals, but it warmed Julia to hear Colin use the old silly re-duplication now. And when he said, ‘Come up to the azalea glen—they’re all out, and you haven’t been yet,’ she agreed at once.