‘Oh, Baby, you are a naughty girl. That’s the second time she has done that, miss. She is just showing off. Ivy, come and wipe this milk off the floor and empty the bath, and then you can go and fetch James and Emmy from Mrs Siddon’s room. They’ve been having tea there, miss.’
Mary wiped Clarissa’s milky mouth with her feeder and lifted her on to her lap again. At such moments, when one’s world crashed about one, and one realised that everything was a hollow sham and particularly David, a fat, speechless Clarissa on one’s knees was a great comfort.
‘You’ve heard our disaster with the canary, miss?’ said Nannie.
‘No, Nannie, what happened?’
‘Well, miss, you remember we were getting a little wife for him. It turned out there was a mistake and she was another little gentleman. So our Dicky quite took against him and pecked him so badly that we had to put him in another cage. And this morning there was our poor new gentleman lying dead on the floor.’
‘Oh, Nannie, how sad.’
‘It was, miss. Ivy cried so she could hardly wash up the breakfast things, and she’s been quite upset all day,’ said Nannie, in whose eyes Ivy had evidently reinstated herself by this proper display of emotion. ‘But I was brought up to believe that all things work together for the best if you look at them rightly, and James had a lovely funeral with the poor little gentleman, didn’t he, Ivy?’
‘He looked so sweet in the coffin, miss,’ said Ivy, beginning to cry again. ‘Master James had the box his new shoes come in, and he lined it with moss ever so nice, and you’d have said the poor little bird was only sleeping, he looked that peaceful. It was beautiful, miss.’
‘That’ll do, Ivy,’ said Nannie, becoming brisk again. ‘Now, Baby, say goodnight to Auntie Mary.’
Clarissa was suddenly taken shy, so Mary kissed her all over the back of her soft neck and went away. Yes, she thought, as she dressed for dinner, that was what life was like. Canaries were pecked to death and David liked a girl like Miss Stevenson. If she had known what he was going to do, no, what he had already done, she would have thrown his strawberries on the ground and stamped on them, if it hadn’t been for the mess.
9
Lady Emily Pays a Call
At the end of July, Martin came home for the holidays. He had been growing in every direction during the summer term and was looking extremely handsome. As the Boulles were to arrive at the vicarage on the first of August, there was no time to be lost, and Martin threw himself with energy into the business of rounding up the village eleven and arranging for the cricket match which was to take place on his seventeenth birthday between the tenant farmers and the estate employees, stiffened by David, Martin and John. There was to be tea in the racquet-court in the interval. A dinner party at Rushwater House, followed by a dance, would conclude the festivities. If the preparations made the Leslies think with a pang of their eldest son’s coming of age, they resolutely put the thought away from them.
Agnes, who was ordering a new evening dress for herself, wanted to get one for Mary, but Mr Leslie, hearing of it, insisted that it should be his present.
‘Get what you like,’ he said. ‘Don’t think if it will last or not. Just get something that will make you look your best. Must do us credit, you know. Go up to town with Agnes, and she’ll see you get the right thing. Good taste, Agnes.’
Indeed Agnes’s clothes, joint product of her own taste, an inspired dressmaker, and a wealthy husband who liked to see his wife well turned out, were always perfect. The commission was much to her liking, and she wrote to John to suggest that they should lunch with him in town. John was delighted and a date was fixed. Mary, while feeling that life as far as she was concerned was over, found the prospect of a new dress not unattractive. Besides, one might see David in London.
The question which now agitated Lady Emily was, should she call on Madame Boulle before Martin went for his first French lesson or after. None of her considerable social experience in the past appeared to be the slightest help to her in this matter. On the very day when the Boulle family were to come into the vicarage she was still undecided.
‘If I call before Martin goes,’ she argued at lunch, ‘they might think I was coming to see if they looked good enough for Martin, but if I don’t go till after he has had a lesson there, it may seem rude. When Papa was being a Governor in India, people used to come and write their names in the book, but that, of course, was so many years ago, and none of us were French. Mr Banister says they are very nice simple people, but that doesn’t make it any easier. Henry, what would you do?’
‘About what, Emily?’
‘Calling on the Boulles.’
‘Calling on who? Oh, Banister’s tenants. Yes, my dear, call on them, of course.’
‘Ask them to tea, Mamma, and we could have the children down,’ said Agnes.
‘Children?’ said Mr Leslie, lifting his eyes from the peach he was peeling. ‘Thought their young people were all grown up. Played tennis and so on. But call on them by all means.’
Lady Emily and her daughter exchanged glances expressive of the difficulties of a world where Papa would join in the conversation without being fully aware what it was about. Mary suggested that Lady Emily should call on the following day, stay just long enough for civility, and ask them all to tea and tennis the day after. After a great many impracticable suggestions this plan was adopted, and Lady Emily professed herself much relieved.
Accordingly, accompanied by Agnes and Martin, who was very unwillingly pressed into the expedition, Lady Emily descended upon the vicarage next afternoon.
Madame Boulle, a stout, middle-aged woman with masses of grey hair, was in the drawing-room and greeted her guests in excellent English.
‘But how kind of you to visit us,’ she exclaimed. ‘We are already installed and everything is of the highest comfort. And this is your grandson who is to study with us? Bien. What is your name, sir?’
Thus addressed, Martin turned bright red and mumbled ‘Leslie.’
‘Naturally, it is Leslie,’ said Madame Boulle. ‘But we shall not call you Leslie, you will be as a son to me. I assure you,’ she added, turning to Agnes, ‘that, a mother myself, I shall give to your son the care I should give to my own.’
‘He isn’t my son, Madame Boulle, he is only my—’
‘Assuredly. I wondered that you should have a son already so old. Naturally he is your young cousin.’
‘No, I’m sorry,’ said Agnes, with a distinct feeling of guilt at spoiling the relationship which Madame Boulle had arranged, ‘he is only my nephew.’
‘Ah, I renounce,’ cried Madame Boulle. ‘It is too complicated. Tu m’expliqueras tout cela plus tard, mon petit, n’est-ce pas?’ she said to Martin, who at once hated everyone with a deadly hatred which he was at no pains to conceal.
‘I feel already that he is my son,’ Madame Boulle explained. ‘I must now present to you the rest of our family. Henri, Pierre, Ursule, Jean-Claude,’ she cried through the open doorway.
No one answered. Madame Boulle said that they were all doubtless in the garden and begged her guests to step that way.
‘Ah, you are cripple?’ she inquired, seeing Lady Emily’s stick.
‘Not exactly,’ said Lady Emily, ‘but I have so much arthritis. I went to Aix once, but it didn’t seem to do me any good.’
‘Aix,’ said Madame Boulle. ‘We all know about Aix. A rabble of doctors who only want to profit by the English. Let me tell you. Do you know Droitwich? No? Then later I shall tell you about it. I have a particular knowledge of all England. But here is my husband and young ones.’
The rest of the Boulle family who were seated under a tree in the garden got up as the visitors approached. Professor Boulle was a tall, good-looking man with a melancholy face and courteous manners. If he rarely spoke it was because of his conviction that anything he said would be interrupted or ignored. Pierre, a young man of about twenty-five, was like his father, though not quite so silent, and Ursule was
stout and like her mother, but not so talkative. In Jean-Claude, Martin recognised with horror the image which David had set up on the night when the plan was first mooted. He was about Martin’s height, but extremely bony. He was wearing khaki shorts and a pullover, socks and sandshoes. His face was incredibly spotty, and on his upper lip, cheeks and chin lay a thick yellow down.
‘You two young people will be comrades,’ declared Madame Boulle, an assertion which was met by her son with a weary acquiescence, by Martin with a scowl of rage. ‘Jean-Claude is, as you see, Boy Scout. He is also impassioned for nature.’
‘I adore nature too, maman,’ said Ursule with a giggle.
‘You will all three make some excursions on foot,’ said Madame Boulle, ‘you, Ursule, and Jean-Claude and Leslie.’
‘But you mustn’t call him Leslie,’ said Lady Emily. ‘His name is Martin.’
‘Ah, Martin. Nom bien français, par exemple. But I shall call you Martine, as you are an English lad.’
Ursule giggled violently and whispered something to her mother.
‘Tais-toi, Ursule,’ said Madame Boulle angrily. ‘Have I not told you repeatedly that it is very ill-bred to whisper in company?’
‘But, maman, if you call him Martine, everyone will think he is a girl,’ giggled Ursule.
‘Ursule, one does not argue with one’s mother. When you are married and have a house of your own you can say what you like. Till then, obedience.’
‘All the same, it is true what Ursule observes,’ her father remarked.
‘Ah, but Henri, this is too much. To encourage Ursule in impertinence on the first day of our arrival. Will Martine then be Sir Leslie when he inherits?’ she asked, turning to Lady Emily.
‘Inherits what?’ asked Lady Emily, bewildered by this change of subject.
‘Inherits of his grandfather, the present Sir Leslie.’
‘My husband is only Mr Leslie,’ Lady Emily began, but was cut short by a torrent of words from Madame Boulle, who was firmly convinced after studying a Debrett which she had found in the vicarage that Martin, in virtue of being an earl’s great-grandson on his mother’s side, would naturally come into a baronetcy at his father’s death. Lady Emily and Agnes tried to explain, but were overwhelmed by Madame Boulle’s display of knowledge. It appeared that she had in her youth been a governess in English families of the highest distinction, and since her marriage had continually received scions of the nobility as paying-guests.
‘You have not abolished your hereditary peerage as we unfortunately have,’ she said, ‘therefore Martine will be, if not Sir Leslie, at least an honourable.’
Martin, goaded almost beyond bearing, said in a loud voice that titles were an awful nuisance. At this Jean-Claude became transformed. He clenched his large hands, his spotty face turned scarlet, the pale fluff on his face seemed to stiffen. Coming close up to Martin he drew him aside, and putting his face right into Martin’s said in a low, threatening voice:
‘You are a republican then?’
‘Good Lord, no. We don’t have a republic here, you know, King George, Roi George,’ he kindly explained.
Jean-Claude’s anger evaporated as quickly as it had risen.
‘That is well,’ he remarked ominously and said no more.
Lady Emily now collected her party and said goodbye, issuing an invitation to tea and tennis to all the Boulles for the next day.
Madame Boulle accepted with voluble ecstasy. It was, she explained, many years since she herself had taken part in a party of tennis, but Pierre, Ursule and Jean-Claude all played magnificently. As for her husband, he was an artist, and could never be depended on.
‘But I thought Mr Banister said he was a professor,’ said Lady Emily.
‘Ah, perfectly. He is a professor, but in soul he is an artist, a poet. Although my own family is of ancient date, bearing the particule, I yet feel it is a distinction to have married an artist soul. Pierre inherits from my husband. He is also artist, but not in the arts, no. On another scene. Oh, one will hear of him in the world.’
Without further explanation she conducted them to the front gate, followed by Jean-Claude.
‘Eh bien, say farewell to your comrade, Jean-Claude,’ said his mother.
But Martin, overcome by fear that Jean-Claude might kiss him, for such he had heard was the custom of foreigners, bolted into the car, where he sat speechless, glowering at his relations. They, to his great surprise, took the Boulle family as a matter of course, and talked of other things, so that Martin had to nurse his anger and reflect that whatever he had let himself in for, it was entirely his own fault. As soon as they got back he went in search of Mary, who was leading Emmy about on the pony. To her he poured out the horror of the afternoon’s expedition.
‘David was right,’ he declared gloomily. ‘That young Claude or whatever his name is, is the most ghastly spotted sight you ever saw, and what’s more he is mad. He wanted to know if I was a republican and old Madame wanted to know if I would be Sir Leslie when grandfather died. The old professor didn’t look so bad, nor did the eldest son, thank heaven. I’m to have my lessons with him, I believe. But the girl is a fat giggling pest, about twenty, I suppose, and thinks she’s a hundred. I say, Mary, they’re all coming up for tennis tomorrow. What on earth shall I do? I’ve got to go for my first lesson tomorrow and then have them up here in the afternoon. Oh, gosh, what ghastly holidays these are going to be. And when I think it’s all my own fault too.’
Overcome by despair he flung himself on to the ground and began pulling the heads off daisies.
‘Never mind, Martin,’ said Mary. ‘Here is Ivy coming to fetch Emmy. Will you take the pony round to the stables and I’ll get my tennis shoes and we’ll have a practice for tomorrow.’
Emmy was taken to bed and Martin, bestriding the pony with both feet well on the ground, conducted it thus to the stables, to the intense joy of the groom. Then he gave Mary fifteen in each game and beat her, so life seemed less hopeless.
It was, however, with a sinking heart that he set out for the vicarage next morning. His chief fear was that someone would kiss him, if not Jean-Claude then Madame Boulle in her maternal mood, or even the professor. But to his great relief he was received by Pierre, who took him to the vicar’s study, examined him in what he knew and set him to work. Pierre was quiet and undemonstrative. Martin was soon at ease in his company and felt the French lessons would not be so bad after all. The only thing that disturbed him was that Pierre would look at him now and then with a curious appraising glance, take breath as if he were going to say something, then resume his lesson again and go on as if nothing had happened. Finally Martin put it down to the queerness of foreigners and took no further notice.
At lunch, however, his old feeling of suspicion returned. Madame Boulle welcomed him as ce cher petit Martine with enthusiasm. Ursule giggled and Jean-Claude looked just as unprepossessing as he had done on the previous day. After they had begun the professor came in and went quietly to his place.
‘What is the soup today?’ he inquired.
‘Lentil soup,’ replied Madame Boulle. ‘These lentils, Martine, are a particular kind which I get from France. They cannot be got in England, nor in Germany, nor in Russia—’
‘But I assure you I have often met them in Germany, Madeleine,’ said her husband.
‘On the contrary, I assure you, Henri, that these lentils can only be got in France. They are very expensive, Martine. Living is expensive everywhere. One has to spend an enormous amount on food in France. Food is more expensive in France than anywhere else.’
‘Food is also very expensive in Spain,’ the professor ventured.
‘Possibly.’
Martin, who could understand their conversation quite well, prayed inwardly that they would go on talking for ever, so that he need never open his mouth. It was one thing to talk with Pierre in the study, where he had somehow expressed himself in what felt to him easy and idiomatic French. But to say anything before the giggling
Ursule or that ghastly Jean-Claude was unthinkable.
Madame Boulle, a conscientious woman, was just going to address a remark to Martin which would force him to take some part in the conversation, when Jean-Claude stretched over the table for a bottle of gherkins and took some out with his own fork. His mother was unable to let pass so excellent an opportunity for edification.
‘Jean-Claude, only very ill-bred people take gherkins with their own fork. And you should offer them to others before taking them yourself.’
‘But, maman, they were in front of me, so why shouldn’t I help myself? It takes much longer to pass them round and then help myself afterwards. Besides, I do not know that anyone wants them.’
‘Jean-Claude, how often have I told you not to argue with your mother? You are only a child. Some day, as I am always telling Ursule, you will have a home of your own and then you can behave as badly as you like. But while you are under my roof I demand obedience.’
‘The roof belongs to Monsieur Banister,’ said Jean-Claude in a low defiant voice which luckily his mother did not hear. He then relapsed into a fit of sulks.
‘Martine,’ said Madame Boulle, turning to her guest, ‘do you want some mustard?’
The blow had fallen. Crimsoning to the ears Martin muttered, ‘Merci.’
‘As you are English,’ said Madame, ‘I know that you mean yes, please. All English make this mistake once, it is entirely natural, and I only point it out to you that you may not repeat it. This is French mustard. French mustard is known all over the world. It is everywhere considered the best. This particular kind of mustard is very expensive. I get it from a special shop in Paris.’
‘What we had last week was better, Madeleine,’ said the professor.
‘Listen, Henri. I have been a housekeeper for many years and I assure you—’
‘But, Madeleine—’
‘It is no good example to Martine to discuss the food at table. I have often begged you not to, Henri. Well, Martine, you are not very talkative, are you?’
Wild Strawberries: A Virago Modern Classic (VMC) Page 13