Wild Strawberries: A Virago Modern Classic (VMC)

by Angela Thirkell

  ‘It’s the cereals, madam. You know Dr Home said Emmy and Baby were to continue with the puffed wheat for the present. I made a point of mentioning it to Mrs Siddon myself when we arrived, not wishing to trouble you nor her ladyship, but this is the third morning that barley kernels have been sent up. I am sure for my own part I am not at all particular, and would really never feel like more than a cup of tea and a piece of toast for my own breakfast, but I thought you ought to know, madam.’

  ‘Oh, Nannie, how annoying,’ said Agnes, with such complete absence of conviction that Nannie spoke again.

  ‘I am sure, madam, I wouldn’t have mentioned it at all, only Dr Home did say that Emmy and Baby were to have the puffed wheat. I am sure Mrs Siddon doesn’t mean anything, but I always like to carry out a doctor’s instructions, otherwise I say it is waste of money. Mrs Dashwood’s nannie never lets her children have barley kernels, they are so heating to the blood. Don’t wriggle like that, Baby, when auntie is putting your nice bedroom slippers on. So I thought you would wish to know.’

  ‘Oh, Nannie, how annoying,’ said Agnes again. ‘I must see about it, mustn’t I, my own precious Clarissa?’

  Clarissa, dried and robed, slid off Mary’s lap and made her way cautiously to her mother, who took her up and hugged her, regardless of the havoc it made with her delicate dress.

  ‘And there is one other thing, madam,’ continued Nannie. ‘Is Ivy to go down for the children’s fruit every morning? I am sure she doesn’t mind, for she is a nice obliging girl, but I don’t see how I am to get the children out by eleven as you wish, madam, if Ivy has to be downstairs getting their fruit. Last time we were here one of the under-housemaids always brought it up, but she has gone and the new girl, Bessie, doesn’t seem to understand, and I have been obliged to send Ivy down for the last two mornings, so we couldn’t get out till nearly twelve and Baby is quite losing her roses.’

  ‘Darling Clarissa,’ said Agnes, whose younger daughter looked as pink and flourishing as could be expected under the horrifying circumstances. ‘I must see Mrs Siddon about it, Nannie. It is so annoying, isn’t it?’

  John then came in.

  ‘Here is Uncle John come to say goodnight to Baby,’ said Nannie, who appeared to regard her employers and their relations as well-disposed half-wits who needed encouragement. ‘Can I leave Baby with you, madam, while I fetch the elder ones? Ivy has gone down to the village on her bike to see about a canary for James.’

  ‘Isn’t one enough?’ said John.

  ‘Oh, no, sir,’ said Nannie pityingly. ‘Canaries pine unless they have a little husband or a little wife, and ever since our little lady died this poor little fellow has been quite mopy.’

  ‘I wish he would keep his grief to himself,’ said John, looking unsympathetically at the sorrowing widower, whose feathers were standing straight out all over him with the vehemence of his song.

  ‘He is only saying “Goodnight”, sir,’ said Nannie, rather shocked. ‘We heard of a little wife in the village, so Ivy is going to get her for James. Then we shall have some nice music again, shan’t we, Baby?’

  Nannie went off to fetch James and Emmy.

  ‘Well, darling John,’ said Agnes, ‘have you had a nice day?’

  ‘I got a lot of business settled with Macpherson and made Mary’s acquaintance,’ said John, smiling kindly at Mary, who looked very pleasant, sitting in her flannel apron by the fire. ‘And Father made up his mind what to call the bull, so we are getting on. Agnes, what I really wanted to talk to you about is Martin. You know his mother wants him to go to a French family for part of the summer holidays. I’m not sure that it is a good plan. Mother and Father are very keen to have him here, and the more he learns about the place the better. It isn’t as if he had a father of his own to carry on. If Father died, and he isn’t as young as he was, Martin would have to walk straight into his responsibilities. His mother and his stepfather will be in America all the summer and it was quite settled that Martin was to be here till his mother got this idea of his learning French. I don’t see why he couldn’t do French next year. Macpherson is always talking of retiring, and Martin ought to be as much with him as he can. Besides school holidays aren’t very long. When he is at Oxford he will have plenty of time to put in a month in France if he wants to. What do you think?’

  ‘I’d better write and ask Robert. He will know exactly what Martin ought to do. Daddy will know, won’t he, darling Clarissa?’

  John restrained an impulse to shake his sister.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘Robert will undoubtedly know exactly what would be best, but it will take about six weeks to get an answer. Meanwhile, will you back me up? I have to go back to town tomorrow morning and Martin goes up with me on his way back to school. If I tackle the parents about it, will you be on my side? Martin’s mother won’t mind either way, so long as he is provided for.’

  ‘Of course you are quite right,’ said Agnes decidedly. ‘Martin ought to be here. I am sure Robert would think he ought to stay here. We do want Martin to stay with us, don’t we, darling Clarissa?’

  Nannie’s return with James and Emmy put an end to the discussion. Clarissa was taken off to bed in the night nursery. Agnes and Mary went downstairs while John stayed behind to give the elder children a riotous ride on Dobbin.

  ‘Let us go and find Mamma,’ said Agnes to her niece. ‘She likes to see me before dinner so that I can do the name cards.’

  They found Lady Emily in the morning-room, writing letters.

  ‘I was just writing to your mother, Mary,’ she explained, ‘to say how we love having you, and how useful you are going to be. Is it twopence halfpenny to Germany?’

  ‘It’s Switzerland, Aunt Emily, but it will be twopence halfpenny all the same. Mummie will love to have a letter from you.’

  ‘I thought Switzerland was cheaper,’ said Lady Emily, ‘because of the League of Nations which seems to make it so English. I am sure when I was at Geneva, when I took David to that delightful professor he was with in one of his long vacations, I met quantities of English friends there. Agnes, do you think Mr Holt was annoyed? Your father was not very kind to him and I feel when anyone is as trying as Mr Holt one should make a special effort to be nice. He didn’t seem pleased at tea-time, but perhaps it is my imagination. We must have him again, and I must ask his friend, Lady Norton. He seemed to want me to ask her. She is a most tiresome woman, and I don’t want her here at all, but perhaps it would be civil. Who is it? Oh, come in, Siddon.’

  ‘I beg pardon, my lady,’ said the housekeeper. ‘I didn’t see Miss Agnes and the young lady was here.’

  Mrs Siddon – Mrs only by courtesy – was a spare, middle-aged woman, who had been stillroom maid in more spacious days, and now ruled Rushwater House with a firm hand. She was devoted to Agnes, and her children, but usually in a state of simmering feud with Nannie, not holding, she said, with those girls from institutions. This was aimed at the highly respectable training-school for children’s nurses, from which Nannie had originally come and whose uniform she wore.

  ‘I beg pardon, my lady, if I am interrupting, but could I speak to you for a moment?’

  Mary looked at Agnes, but her aunt’s face betrayed no emotion.

  ‘It’s about the children’s breakfasts, my lady. I am sure I would wish to study nurse’s fancies in every way, but to send down her breakfast untouched for two mornings and then say it is because the children don’t like their cereals is hardly reasonable. And as for the fruit, I am sure I have no wish for Ivy to come down for it, and I would be glad, Miss Agnes, if you would speak to Ivy, because skylarking in the pantry with Walter is what she does. The fruit is put out every morning for Bessie to take up to the nursery, but when Mr David and Mr Martin are here they get up so late that she gets behindhand with her work.’

  ‘Well, Siddon, that is all too dreadful,’ said Lady Emily, ‘and we must see about it. Couldn’t Bessie just run up with the fruit a little earlier?’

  ‘O
f course, my lady, if you wish Mr David and Mr Martin’s beds to be left, she could,’ said Mrs Siddon, resolutely thrusting away responsibility.

  ‘Mamma darling, I am afraid Nannie is being a little difficult, and I am quite worried,’ said Agnes with a serene countenance.

  ‘It was just the same when you were all little,’ said Lady Emily to Agnes. ‘You remember old Baker, Siddon, when she was housekeeper, how she always quarrelled with the children’s nurses all about nothing.’

  ‘Mrs Baker, my lady, was of a difficult temper, as well I know, having been under her. It wasn’t only Miss Agnes and the young gentlemen’s nurses, but the maddermazells and the frawlines. We never had peace, as we used to remark in the Hall. But I am sure I am the last to take offence, and I am only too wishful to meet nurse halfway sooner than have any difficulty, or worry your ladyship or Miss Agnes.’

  Having so far perjured herself, Mrs Siddon waited with an expressionless face.

  ‘Well, Siddy,’ said Agnes taking up her embroidery, ‘I am sure it is all most annoying, and if the children don’t like their cereals they are bad little things. Mamma, did you take my green wool?’

  ‘Yes, Agnes. I wanted some this afternoon, though I can’t think what for. I thought I put it back in your bag.’

  ‘Perhaps it has gone on the floor,’ said Agnes.

  ‘Is this it?’ asked Mary, picking up a ball of green wool which was lying in a pot of carnations.

  Thank you, dear,’ said Lady Emily. ‘I know now! I wanted to tie up those carnations and then tea was ready. Well, Siddon, we must see about it and Mrs Graham must speak to Ivy.’

  ‘Aunt Emily,’ said Mary, ‘excuse me interfering, but Nannie did say she wanted puffed wheat instead of barley kernels, because the doctor said so.’

  After a good deal of talk, to which Agnes’s only contribution was that darling Clarissa looked so sweet eating her cereals, Mrs Siddon agreed to provide puffed wheat for the nursery and see that the children’s fruit went up with their breakfast.

  ‘I am much obliged to you for mentioning it, miss,’ she said to Mary. ‘If nurse had demeaned herself to explain what was wrong, I should have ordered puffed wheat at once. But eggs and bacon coming down all cold on a plate are no explanation at all. Thank you, my lady.’

  ‘Now, Mamma,’ said Agnes, ‘we can do the name cards.’

  5

  Some Aspects of Milton

  At dinner Mary found herself between Mr Leslie and John. She wished it had been David, as she had an uneasy feeling that John found her rather young and rather a bore. But with Mr Leslie she got on excellently. She listened to his stories about his cattle and was placed in his mind as a thoroughly sensible kind of girl. Pity David couldn’t find some nice girl like that, he thought, instead of the queer young women he brought down from time to time. Encouraged by her interest he gave her a detailed account of the trouble they had had in getting someone to play the organ in church since the old schoolmaster died.

  ‘We really ought to ask the education people to let us have someone musical next time,’ said John, who had overheard his father’s remarks. ‘This young woman means well, but her idea of an organ is the electric organ at a cinema, all vox humana and tremolo.’

  ‘Lovely things those organs,’ said David. ‘The keyboard always reminds me of a gigantic set of false teeth.’

  ‘Do you play the organ, Mr Leslie?’ said Mary to John, trying to make conversation.

  ‘A bit. I hope you aren’t going to call me Mr Leslie though. I shan’t know if I am myself or my father.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Mary, wondering whether she was to say John or Uncle John. He was older than Aunt Agnes, so she supposed Uncle John would be more suitable, but it seemed a little ridiculous. After all, Aunt Agnes was married to Uncle Robert and had three children, so she was a real aunt. But this Mr Leslie with no wives or children didn’t seem to have the status of an uncle. To call him John, on the other hand, was a familiarity from which she rather shrank. She didn’t know how old he was, but he must be quite middle-aged, though he wasn’t at all fat or bald. From which we may gather that Mary’s ideas of middle-age were not very sound.

  ‘Does David play?’ she asked, bringing out his name with a little difficulty and wondering if this Mr Leslie would think her impertinent. But to her relief he took it all quite calmly.

  ‘Not the organ,’ he said, ‘but he plays the piano very well. If you want any jazz, put David at the piano and he will do the rest.’

  ‘Oh, I adore jazz.’

  ‘So do I,’ said John, ‘but I can’t play it – haven’t got the gift. I only play highbrow stuff. What about you?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t do anything in particular. I like listening.’

  When pudding had subsided, Martin, who had been strangely quiet all through dinner, suddenly said in a loud and ill-assured voice: ‘I say, Grandfather.’

  Though Martin’s voice had broken some years ago, it still had an uncomfortable tendency to betray him in moments of emotion, and detaching itself from his control, emerge as a squeak or a bellow. At this moment it was a deep bass which startled him as much as it did the rest of the company. The silence that followed was so complete that Martin blushed to the roots of his dark hair.

  ‘Owbridge’s lung tonic for you tonight, my boy,’ said David.

  ‘Well, Martin?’ said his grandfather.

  ‘I say, Grandfather, it’s about this plan of me going abroad in the summer. I’ve got an awfully good idea if you and Gran don’t mind. You know Mr Banister is letting his house to those French professor people. Why couldn’t I be a P.G. there for August? I could learn a lot of French and then I wouldn’t have to be away all the summer.’

  ‘This requires a little consideration,’ said his grandfather, secretly not displeased at the idea of having Martin near him for the holidays. ‘Your mother was arranging for you to go to France and she may not wish to alter her plans.’

  ‘Oh, Mother will be all right, sir. I say, Grandfather,’ he repeated, his eager face looking younger than ever by the candlelight which was now the only light in the room, ‘don’t you think we could work it? It would be a ripping plan. I’ve had a jaw with Mr Banister about it, and he says these Boulles always take pupils in France and he doesn’t see why they wouldn’t in England. And then there are two sons, one is a professor and awfully good at French and the other is about my age, so I could learn a lot.’

  At any other time the prospect of spending a month in the company of a French boy of his own age would have filled Martin with terror and disgust, but in the light of his new plan young Master Boulle was assuming sterling qualities.

  ‘I know exactly what young Boulle will be like,’ said David. ‘If he is your age he will have knickerbockers and short socks and a sailor blouse, and a fluffy moustache and beard that his fond Mamma won’t let him shave, and lots of spots on his face.’

  ‘Oh, shut up, David.’

  ‘And you will have to learn La Fontaine by heart,’ continued David, ‘and recite your piece to show your kind grandparents what progress you have made.’

  ‘I once knew a very nice French boy,’ said Mary, feeling sorry for Martin. ‘He played tennis awfully well and looked just like anyone else and hadn’t any spots at all. And he was just about Martin’s age.’

  Having said this, she subsided into embarrassment, thinking her remark stupid and unhelpful. But Martin clutched at it with enthusiasm.

  ‘I dare say this chap plays quite well, too,’ he said. ‘Gran, don’t you think I could?’

  ‘I think it is such a good plan,’ said Lady Emily. ‘If they haven’t enough beds at the vicarage we could easily send one down for you, and some sheets, because I don’t suppose Mr Banister has enough. And of course they’ll get their milk from us, because Gooch’s milk in the village really can’t be trusted. I do hope, Henry, the vicarage drains are all right if Martin is to go there, because the French are rather vague about drains.’

  ‘Yes, b
ut darling, they aren’t bringing their drains with them,’ said David.

  ‘No, of course not, David, don’t be so unreasonable. You know perfectly well what I mean. When you were all little I would never take you to any lodgings at the sea till all the drains had been tested. Well, it’s a delicious plan and we must have a long talk about it and see what Mr Banister says.’

  ‘If the vicarage drains are out of order it’s Banister’s fault,’ said Mr Leslie angrily. ‘Macpherson had them overhauled only the year before last and it cost me a matter of fifty-five pounds. Why he had to let the vicarage to foreigners, I don’t know. Have an outbreak of typhoid as likely as not.’

  Martin was going to expostulate, but a look from John warned him that it was not the moment. While Lady Emily collected her spectacles, which had got into a banana skin, and readjusted her shawl, John said to Martin:

  ‘I’m delighted with your plan, Martin. Don’t bother Grandfather about it again just now. I’ll see him before I go and it will be all right.’

  ‘Oh, thanks awfully, Uncle John.’

  Mary heard this conversation and her heart warmed to John for his kindness to Martin.

  *

  ‘Now, Mamma, where will you sit?’ said Agnes when the ladies reached the drawing-room.

  ‘I’m going to be very selfish and have this long comfortable chair by the fire,’ said Lady Emily, letting herself down into it. ‘Now, I shall put my feet up. Put my red shawl over them, Agnes; it is on the table with my painting things.’

  ‘It isn’t here, Mamma.’

  ‘Then I know where it is,’ said Lady Emily triumphantly. ‘It is on the chest of drawers, not the walnut one, the other one, in my room. I told Conque I would want it.’

  ‘Can I get it for you, Aunt Emily?’ asked Mary.

  ‘Yes, dear, do. And you will find too a very large bag of embroidery on a chair.’

  ‘Mamma, you have got your red shawl under you,’ said Agnes reproachfully, ‘and the embroidery is on your worktable. Don’t you remember you left it here last night, and that was why you hadn’t got any green wool and took some of mine to tie the carnations up.’