by Barbara Pym
‘I expect they’re sitting on them now, having their dinner,’ said Mr. Whiting.
‘Dinner isn’t what they have,’ said Mr. Mortlake. ‘They have the big meal midday. Mrs. Glaze leaves something for them, whatever can be heated up, or a salad.’
‘Ah, it was very different in Canon Pritchard’s time,’ said Mr. Whiting on a note of lamentation which seemed excessive for the triviality of the subject. ‘Even during the war years they had the big meal in the evening. It seems more in keeping.’
‘The dignity of the office,’ said Mr. Mortlake. ‘But then Mrs. Pritchard filled her position well. And she was a wonderful cook. I know that. They say Mrs. Cleveland hardly knows how to open a tin. It isn’t fair on the vicar.’
‘You never know, it might hold him back from promotion,’ said Mr. Whiting. ‘A man is often judged by his wife.’
‘That evening she came to the choir vestry. It was most importunate …’
‘She may have thought she was doing good,’ said Mr. Whiting rapidly, lowering his voice at the sound of approaching footsteps. Although it was not the vicar or his wife but Miss Doggett who came into the room, the conversation could not be continued along its former lines, and changed to more uninteresting topics — the approach of spring, the drawing out of the days. By the time Mrs. Crampton and Mrs. Mayhew and Mr. Glaze had arrived, they were on to the subject of summer holidays.
It was at this moment that Jane and Nicholas chose to make their entry, Nicholas, as Chairman, taking his place at the table and Jane sitting down on one of the bedroom chairs at the back near the door.
‘Well, is everyone here?’ Nicholas asked in a brisk tone which he seemed to have assumed specially for the meeting.
‘Mr. Oliver hasn’t arrived yet,’ said Mr. Mortlake.
‘Oh.’ Nicholas looked at his watch. ‘Well, it is after half-past eight. Perhaps something has kept him. I think we should begin.’ He stood up. ‘Shall we say a prayer?’
They rose to their feet and bowed their heads. Jane tried very hard to realise the Presence of God in the vicarage drawing-room, but failed as usual, hearing through the silence only Mrs. Glaze running water in the back kitchen to wash up the supper things.
The meeting began with Mr. Mortlake’s reading of the minutes. During this Mr. Oliver came in and sat by Jane at the back on the other bedroom chair. Mr. Glaze then stood up and gave a report on the water tank at the church hall. Something was blocked, dead leaves and dust had formed some kind of an obstruction; it was all highly technical. Jane could see that there was a puzzled frown on Nicholas’s face as he tried to follow. She herself had given up any attempt to take an intelligent interest in the proceedings. It seemed that there was a particular kind of hat worn by ladies attending Parochial Church Council meetings — a large beret of neutral-coloured felt pulled well down to one side. Both Mrs. Crampton and Mrs. Mayhew wore hats of this type, as did Miss Doggett, though hers was of a superior material, a kind of plush decorated with a large jewelled pin. Indeed, there seemed to be little for the ladies to do but observe each other’s hats, for their voices were seldom heard. Occasionally Nicholas would interpose with some remark, such as ‘Now what do you feel, Miss Doggett? I am sure we should all like to hear your views on this point,’ but as it was usually a matter such as the taxation of the Easter Offering, on which ladies could not be expected to have any sensible views, their comments amounted to very little and were soon disposed of and even made to seem slightly ridiculous by the men.
‘And now we come to the parish magazine cover,’ said Nicholas, gently but firmly curtailing Mr. Mortlake’s dissertation on Income Tax. ‘I believe everybody is not quite happy about it.’
‘No, certainly not.’ Jane, who was sitting by him, was quite startled by the violence of Mr. Oliver’s protest. ‘I must say I was most surprised to see the photograph of the lych-gate on the new cover. I was under the impression, and I may say that I believe others were too, that we had definitely decided to use the photograph of the high altar.’
‘Yes, that was so,’ said Nicholas hastily, ‘but we did feel — the standing committee, that is — that as both photographs were equally suitable — you will remember I’m sure, Mr. Oliver, that we had great difficulty in deciding which we liked best — the Council would have no objection to our using the photograph of the lych-gate.’
‘But why couldn’t we have the high altar?’ asked Miss Doggett bluntly. ‘It seems to me to give a better idea of our beautiful old church.’
‘Well, there were certain difficulties,’ said Nicholas rather too weakly for a Chairman.
‘Not to put too fine a point on it,’ said Mr. Mortlake, ‘the vicar and the churchwardens did feel, after considering the matter, that there was a danger of the cover of our magazine looking too much like that of St. Stephen’s.’
‘“Well, really,’ Jane burst out, ‘I never heard anything so ridiculous. Even if the covers looked alike, there could certainly be no confusion over the contents. High Mass, Confessions and all that…’
Nicholas, who had thought it wiser to keep this matter of the magazine cover from his wife, smiled unhappily. She would never learn when not to speak, he thought, with rather less affectionate tolerance than usual. Not for the first time he began to consider that there was, after all, something to be said for the celibacy of the clergy.
Jane realised from Nicholas’s laugh and the uncomfortable silence that followed that she ought not to have spoken. ‘I wonder whether a cup of tea would help us to see things in better perspective,’ she said quickly. ‘I will just go and see Mrs. Glaze about it,’ she added, hurrying from the room.
‘A cup of tea always helps,’ said Mrs. Mayhew in a rather high, fluty voice. ‘It can never come amiss.’
‘I shouldn’t like to contradict a lady,’ said Mr. Oliver, ‘but I do feel that this is perhaps not quite the moment.’
‘If you wouldn’t like to contradict a lady, then why do it,’ said Mr. Whiting, in something of a quandary, for he would have liked to agree with Mr. Oliver that this was perhaps hardly the time and place for a cup of tea.
‘I think the best thing we can do is to take a vote on the matter of the cover,’ said Nicholas hastily; ‘then we can have the matter settled before the tea arrives.’
Everybody seemed willing to accept this suggestion, with the possible exception of Mr. Oliver, who sat looking sulky. There was a show of hands and the result was that everybody except Mr. Oliver voted in favour of having the photograph of the lych-gate on the magazine cover. Miss Doggett, who had raised a mild objection, confided to Mrs. Crampton and Mrs. Mayhew that of course she quite saw that it wouldn’t do to have the picture of the high altar if there was any danger of their magazine being confused with that of Father Lomax’s church.
‘What a nice idea to have refreshments,’ said Mrs. Crampton as the rattle of china was heard outside the door. ‘We never had them in Canon Pritchard’s time.’
‘Well, it seemed a good idea,’ said Jane from the open doorway. ‘I always think when I’m listening to some of these tense, gloomy plays on the wireless, Ibsen and things like that, oh, if only somebody would think of making a cup of tea!’
‘I hope our meeting doesn’t strike you in that way,’ said Mr. Whiting. ‘They have usually been friendly affairs. There was never any necessity for a cup of tea in Canon Pritchard’s time. We never had any unpleasantness then.’
‘The Canon did have the knack as you might say of keeping certain people in their places,’ observed Mr. Glaze.
‘Do you mean blundering vicar’s wives?’ asked Jane pleasantly. ‘Why, Mr. Oliver seems to have gone,’ she exclaimed, standing with a cup of tea in her hand.
‘I think he slipped out when you were bringing in the tea, Mrs. Cleveland,’ said Mrs. Mayhew.
‘He might have excused himself,’ said Mr. Mortlake; ‘but then one has ceased to expect these small courtesies from young men now.’
‘I am sure I heard a nightingale the
other night,’ said Nicholas rather loudly. ‘Would that be possible, Mr. Mortlake? Is the bird known to occur in these parts?’
Jane, who was sitting rather gloomily on a bedroom chair at the back, brightened up at the expression her husband had used — did birds occur? — but then lapsed into brooding silence again.
O for a beaker full of the warm South,
she thought sadly, clasping her hands round her teacup and looking into its depths. She sat thus for several moments, trying to see how much of the Ode she could remember, but the few lines that came to her did not bring her comfort —
Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other groan…
…but in the next moment, they were all standing up and Nicholas was giving the Blessing and the meeting was over.
‘Was it a success, having it here and with refreshments?’ she asked him as the last footsteps scrunched away down the drive. ‘Do you think it came off?’
‘My dear, I wish you had not said what you did,’ said Nicholas gravely.
‘I, say anything?’ Jane looked bewildered for a moment. ‘But I always say what I think, and it was ridiculous all that fuss about the magazine cover and Father Lomax.’
‘Yes, it was a small thing, but Mortlake and Whiting seemed to think it important. You cannot expect them to see things as we do.’
‘Why should we always do what they want,’ Jane burst out. ‘Oh, if I had known it would be like this ..She ran from the room and into the downstairs cloakroom, where the sight of Nicholas’s soap animals reminded her of her love for him and she might have wept had she not been past the age when one considers that weeping can do good or bring relief.
Instead she came back into the drawing-room and began moving chairs about rather aimlessly, not remembering where they had come from.
‘If only you could have been a chaplain at an Oxford college,’ she lamented. ‘You’re wasted here.’
‘But, darling, you always said you wanted to be in a country parish. You were so pleased.’
‘I know, but I didn’t think it would be like this. I thought people in the country were somehow noble, through contact with the earth and Nature, I suppose,’ she smiled; ‘and all the time they’re just worrying about petty details like water-tanks and magazine covers! — like people in the suburbs do’.
‘We must accept people as we find them and do the best we can,’ said Nicholas in too casual a tone to sound priggish. He stood up and began pacing about the room. ‘Now I have thought of a wonderful idea. I am going to grow my own tobacco. Don’t you think it would be interesting as well as a great saving?’
‘Certainly, darling; what interests you do have in your life,’ said Jane humbly. ‘Shall we try to finish these sandwiches?’
And so they sat down on either side of the fire, two essentially good people, eating thick slices of bread spread with a paste made of ‘prawns (and other fish)’, Nicholas reading a book about tobacco-growing, and Jane wondering how she could make up for her tactlessness this evening. Perhaps by going to see Mr. Oliver and trying to reason with him, perhaps by visiting Mr. Mortlake, though even she shrank from that. She began imagining herself being shown into the front parlour, waiting, examining the photographs and ornaments … No, she had better leave well alone and concentrate on the things she could do, whatever they might be.
Chapter Fifteen
WHEN MISS DOGGETT reached home, she found, rather to her annoyance, that Miss Morrow was not there. Then she remembered that it was her evening out, for Jessie had insisted on having a definite free evening of her own, and that she had said she would probably go to the cinema. She had evidently gone out in a hurry, Miss Doggett decided, looking through the open bedroom door at the clothes flung down on the bed and the litter of cosmetics on the dressing-table. It seemed as if Jessie had been in doubt as to what to wear and also as if she had taken considerable trouble over her appearance, a thing she did not usually do. In this Miss Doggett was perfectly right, for no sooner had she left the house at a quarter to eight to go to the Parochial Church Council meeting than Jessie had hurried upstairs to her room.
To-night she was going to see Fabian. Not by invitation, for it would not have occurred to him to invite her in formally, but as a surprise. He often sat listening to the wireless in the evenings after he had had his dinner — she knew that. Sometimes he went out to the pub or the Golden Lion, but she would have to chance that.
She had a special dress she was going to wear, a blue velvet one which had belonged to Constance and which she had altered to fit herself. She knew that men did not notice things like that, but even if he did she was confident that she would be able to carry off any embarrassment successfully.
As she sat at the dressing-table, she felt like a character in a novel, examining each feature, the sharp nose, the large grey eyes and rather too small mouth. She worked carefully, smoothing on a peach-coloured foundation lotion, blending in rouge, powdering, outlining and filling in her mouth, shading her eyelids with blue and darkening her lashes. When she had finished she was quite pleased with the result. She was thirty-seven, older than Mrs. Cleveland’s friend, Prudence Bates, but younger than poor Constance and than Fabian himself. She had always loved him, but it had not occurred to her until that autumn day in the garden when she had seen him looking out of the window that anything could be done about it. She was not the person to cherish a hopeless romantic love for a man, especially if he were free and lived next door, and now that Prudence Bates had come into his life Jessie felt that she must act quickly. It seemed to her entirely appropriate that she should lay her plans while Miss Doggett was at a meeting of the Parochial Church Council, discussing the parish magazine cover.
At a quarter to nine she left the house, looking carefully as she stepped out of the gate to see whether anyone had observed her; but it was dark and there was nobody about. She opened Fabian’s garden gate and then slipped quietly down the side of the house to the back, where the drawing-room french windows opened on to the garden. This evening they were lighted and the curtains not yet drawn; she saw Fabian in a velvet smoking jacket, sitting by the fire with a glass of some amber-coloured liquid — whisky, perhaps — on a small table at his side. There was a blotter on his knees and he appeared to be writing a letter.
Appeared to be writing was a correct impression, for he sat with his pen in his hand adding nothing to the few words he had already written. He did not find it easy to write to Prudence. To begin with, he had never been much of a letter-writer, and then her letters were of such a high literary standard, so much embellished with suitable quotations that he found it quite impossible to equal them. He felt that this was wrong; the man should be the better letter-writer, not the woman, though he remembered that he had never been able to equal Constance’s either. It was ironical to think how much better she would have been able to answer Prudence’s letter than he could himself. He thought that perhaps he should give up trying for this evening; he might stroll round to the Golden Lion for a nightcap later on; it was possible that the walk might give him some inspiration. It seemed to be quite a pleasant evening, he thought, going to the windows to draw the long dark green brocade curtains.
As he stood there he saw a figure move out of the shelter of a rhododendron bush — a woman whom he did not recognise stood there looking at him. For a moment he felt alarmed, and she smiled and he saw that it was Jessie Morrow.
‘Why, what are you doing there in the gloaming?’ he called out in a rather forced way. ‘Won’t you come in? Is Miss Doggett with you?’ He was conscious as he said it of the incongruity of Miss Doggett lurking in bushes.
Jessie stepped in through the open french window and he shut it and drew the curtains behind her. ‘No. I am alone this evening,’ she said, ‘and I wondered if you were too, and if I would have the courage to call o
n you. Well, I did have, so here I am.’
‘Sit down,’ said Fabian, drawing up another chair to the fire. Now he could not possibly go on struggling with his letter to Prudence. ‘What would you like now, a cup of tea or a hot drink of some kind?’
Jessie said nothing, but her eyes were fixed on the amber-coloured liquid on the little table.
‘Would you like whisky?’ Fabian’s eyes lighted up and he fetched another glass. ‘Somehow I didn’t imagine you as liking it.’
‘What did you imagine that I liked?’
‘I don’t know. I suppose I never thought.’
‘You mean you never thought of me as a human being at all? As a person who could like anything?’
‘Well, I don’t know … but you seem different tonight.’ Fabian looked at her, a little puzzled, appraising her. ‘Your dress is becoming.’
‘Yes, I think it is, and I’m glad you think so.’
‘Constance had a dress rather like that once. Velvet, isn’t it?’
‘Yes — I think I remember it.’ But fancy him remembering, she thought. It was a little unnerving the way men sometimes did — not that she feared he would recognise the dress as being the same one altered to fit her; it was just that an unsuspected depth had been revealed in him, and she realised that she might not know him quite so well as she had imagined she did.
‘I think Constance would like to think of us sitting here together,’ said Fabian. ‘She was always very fond of you. You were very good to her.’
‘Was I?’ said Jessie in a rather brisk tone. ‘I suppose I was better to her than you were. That wouldn’t have been difficult.’
‘What hurtful things you say! As if I didn’t realise it. I am not quite so insensitive as you seem to imagine.’
‘I’m sorry. My sharp tongue runs away with me sometimes.’ Jessie noticed without surprise but with a kind of comfortable satisfaction that Fabian’s arm had somehow placed itself round her shoulders. She leaned her head back against his sleeve.