6. Sussex, August 1938
It was a minefield. Her new friend Venetia Gordon-Canning had invited Phyllis and Hugh to meet the great man at dinner on the Saturday evening when he was to be staying with them; and then Patricia had asked them to lunch on the Sunday, also for Phyllis to meet him. Neither of them had asked Nina, who was still hoping – along with everyone else at the camp-site – that the Leader would stay overnight in the pristine bunk of the wooden shed. Patricia had not invited the Gordon-Cannings to her luncheon party, nor had Venetia asked Patricia and Greville to her dinner the night before. Neither was sure whether he would be coming with his wife or alone, which played havoc with seating plans.
Nina and Patricia and even the usually irreverent Venetia spoke of the coming visit in awed tones. All three of them believed that Phyllis’s first glimpse of the Leader was to be at their behest: they each talked as if they were bestowing a great gift upon her. Both hostesses had requested that Phyllis keep the details of their invitations to herself and this made her uneasy, since she was sure both her sisters would discover her deception. She felt especially awkward about Nina’s exclusion from the rarefied world of cut glass and engraved cigarette cases and high gossip in which she found herself included. Matters were further complicated by the fact that everyone seemed to have different names for him. The rank and file at camp referred to him as either the Leader or Sir Oswald. Nina and Eric and the other more senior camp officials also referred to him as the Leader, but tended to prefer the slightly more familiar OM or its extrapolation, the Old Man. Patricia and Venetia and their husbands called him Tom: all his social circle did. So he was Tom when the Gordon-Cannings spoke of him as a guest or friend, but they both switched to the Leader when touching on Party business or politics; a habit which Hugh had adopted. Venetia let slip that his new wife always addressed him as Kit. Phyllis had no idea what to call him.
In the event, it hardly mattered. Phyllis did not get the chance to meet him during the day he spent at the camp, when he was constantly surrounded by enthusiastic campers and minor Party officials. Mobbed, really. An atmosphere of high gaiety marked the visit, an almost electrical charge, as if a brighter lightbulb had been inserted into the lamp of the day. He spoke of a Britain restored to greatness, yet encompassing all that was best about the industry and invention of the present day: ‘From the ashes of the past shall rise a Merrie England of gay and serene manhood and adorned by the miracle of the modern age and the modern mind.’ It was heady stuff.
Phyllis wasn’t seated next to him at Venetia’s dinner, of which she was glad: for what would she be able to find to talk about with such a powerful and important man? But she was pleased at least to have been introduced. He was the most well-known person she had ever met. Probably everyone in the country knew his name, recognized his face. As they shook hands, this thought made her too awed to take in more than the flash of an eye, a scrutiny which seemed to go on ever so slightly longer than it needed to. There was something tawny, a bird-of-prey glint. He carried his head in a very distinctive way, almost as if he were a military official surveying the troops. Imperious. She’d heard he was a champion fencer and wondered if this was why he made her think of Errol Flynn, a resemblance increased by his narrow moustache and pomaded hair. She had no opportunity to actually talk with him, but it was fascinating to watch him, up at the far end of the dinner table. He had such poise, such ease. She strained to catch something of his conversation. After dinner the men stayed a long time in the dining room, and when they emerged he took a seat by Venetia, on the sofa. Venetia laughed elaborately whenever he said anything.
Arriving at her sister’s for lunch the following day, she could see that Patricia was nervous. She was flustered and snappish.
‘Antonia, could you take the others outside before lunch? There’s time for a game of croquet, if you don’t dither,’ she suggested.
‘I don’t really want to play croquet,’ said her daughter.
‘Well then, can’t you run about on the lawn, play grandmother’s footsteps or something. Honestly! What I mean is, I don’t want the young taking up all the chairs in the drawing room.’
‘Oh.’ But still Antonia lingered.
‘Go on then, please darling. Don’t hover. It’s a lovely day.’
Greville’s sister Loelia was staying, with her husband Peter. She was a nice woman, with slightly protuberant eyes, like a pug. The drawing room was full of Patricia and Greville’s friends: Pea-Brain, the Templetons, the Orde-Windhams, the Thredhams. Phyllis was glad to see Sarita, graceful in fawn silk, with a double strand of pearls fastened with a sapphire clasp the size of a Fox’s Glacier mint. Everyone fell silent when the guest of honour arrived. Greville fetched him a drink while Patricia took him around, making introductions.
‘We meet again,’ he said to Phyllis.
‘Why, have you met before?’ said Patricia sharply.
‘Only just in passing at the camp yesterday. We …’ said Phyllis.
‘Oh yes, well, the camp. And of course you know Johnny,’ said Patricia, moving on.
As he shook Johnny Thredham’s hand Mosley glanced back at Phyllis. There was a frankness and complicity in his look which made her feel terribly exposed. It was almost as if he were an X-ray camera and could perceive in her something wicked that she herself had not identified and could hardly welcome. Phyllis felt overwhelmed by his gaze – was this what people meant by star-struck? She lowered her eyes and stared into her sherry glass instead, waiting for him to look away. She was relieved that once again she had not been seated near him. As soon as he was introduced to Sarita he had eyes only for her: Patricia was clearly put out when he did not turn towards her after the first course had been removed, but carried on talking to Sarita until nearly the end of pudding. And Patricia had further cause to look pained when, towards the end of lunch, a disagreement between Hugh and Greville veered close to a quarrel. Hugh repeatedly asked whether his host was actually a Party member. At first Greville had attempted to deflect the question, but at last he could bat it off no longer.
‘I’m sure Tom won’t feel remotely slighted that I’m not. We’ve talked a great deal over the years and he knows my views. But quite frankly the only organizations I care to belong to are those my father was a member of.’
‘The Party isn’t an old school or a club. It’s rather more important than that,’ said Hugh. Phyllis noticed an obstinate set to his features which suggested he had had rather more to drink than was his custom.
‘The zeal of the newly converted,’ said Johnny Thredham in a lowered tone.
Fergus Templeton spoke up. ‘Speaking of clubs, there’s an old boy I sometimes get talking to at White’s. I’ve never heard him say anything except “Splendid!” Don’t think he can really hear one. It’s remarkable how well it does as a response to almost everything. Except when someone says something gloomy, then it can go a bit wrong. Simon Lancaster was describing a funeral they’d been to and the old fellow kept saying, “Splendid. Splendid.” ’
Everyone smiled, relieved.
Pea-Brain spoke. ‘Reminds me of a story I heard the other day. You all know Jimmy Jenkinson, I take it? Northants? Well, the local vicar wanted to see him about something or other, so JJ’s wife had made him promise he’d behave himself from eleven thirty until midday and then she’d come in under some pretext so they could get rid of the fellow. So the vicar arrived promptly but he would keep boring on about this and that. You know what clerics are like, they get one foot in the door. Anyway, JJ got a bit twitchy as the hour approached and in the end he heard the clock chime. His wife came into the room as promised, so JJ stood up and said: “Ah vicar, you’ll have to excuse me. It’s twelve noon and I’ve got to fuck the nanny.” And luckily the vicar was deaf as a post so he just rose and said: “Of course, of course.” ’
There was general laughter.
‘How priceless!’ said Patricia.
Phyllis looked at her. In other company she would have be
en shocked by such talk.
‘Very colourful,’ said Hugh.
‘Mrs JJ was not best pleased,’ added Pea-Brain.
‘I should think not,’ said Greville. ‘But I daresay she soon got over it. Caroline Jenkinson’s a good sort.’
‘She’s forgiven JJ far worse than that,’ said Johnny Thredham.
‘Quite,’ said Pea-Brain.
The earlier awkwardness was forgotten among the lunch guests, but Phyllis knew that she had not heard the last of it. Her husband was sure to go on complaining about what he saw as weakness in his brother-in-law. It would spoil their journey home and possibly beyond, if she couldn’t find a distraction. In private Hugh often described Greville as ‘lily-livered’, and this question of Party membership was a sore point with him. It was all very well, entertaining the Party grandees, but real allegiance went rather deeper than the luncheon table. Hugh himself had joined up with enthusiasm and carried his membership card everywhere, tucked into his wallet as if it were a passe-partout.
A few days afterwards Venetia came for tea.
‘Isn’t he attractive?’ she said. ‘Everyone thinks so. All he has to do is look and one’s horizontal. I know I was. Promise you won’t breathe a word, though, won’t you? Andrew’s loyalty to the cause probably doesn’t extend quite as far as allowing his wife a roll in the hay with Tom.’
Phyllis giggled. She was getting more used to Venetia. She chose to believe that her friend was endearingly mischievous, where once she might have thought her immoral. She felt lucky that someone so sophisticated should enjoy her company.
‘Of course he was much more fun before he was married,’ she went on.
‘But I thought he’d always been married. Wasn’t he married before?’ said Phyllis.
‘Oh, he was. I meant before he was married this time. When he was still married to poor Cim.’
‘Oh,’ said Phyllis. ‘Are there children?’
‘Three, with Cimmie. Her sister, his former sister-in-law, looks after them I believe. Not the sister he had the affair with, the other one: the horsey one. Obviously someone as busy as he is couldn’t be expected to be in charge of a nursery. The talk now is that Diana’s expecting a baby.’
‘Crikey, that all sounds very muddling. Is he faithful to her, the new wife?’
‘Heavens, no, I shouldn’t think so. One rather hopes not, anyway. The thing that’s irresistible is that he always looks a teensy bit bored and yet a teensy bit amused at the same time. So one longs to win over the amused part of him and banish the bored part. I’d practically tap-dance if he asked me to. One would do almost anything to make him be pleased with one,’ said Venetia.
Such loucheness was in sharp contrast to the jubilant talk at camp. Here it was agreed that the visit had been characterized by typical Leader weather: a brilliant day, hotter and clearer than those which preceded or followed. Old hands insisted that his sojourns – for he had been known to stay overnight, in previous years – were always marked by such a favourable climate. OM adored sea-bathing and could always be relied upon to be the first into the waves, so it was fortunate that he brought such weather with him. What was remarkable too was the feeling that everyone who met him came away with, the sense of an encounter that was unhurried, warm and entirely their own. And he was a true gentleman who saw the individual in each one of his followers, while bringing the same genial interest and authority to every encounter. In the afternoon he had addressed the campers from an impromptu platform on a trailer in the middle of the field. He could not have inspired them more had he been speaking at the carved lectern of one of the great historic halls of Westminster. No one standing there on the sun-whitened grass was in any doubt that he could lead a proud nation and her dependencies to a bright future. The tragedy was that such a project as his was very far from the nation’s heart at present. Everyone at camp believed that here was the one man who could drive a final death blow into the already weak and dying behemoth of the League of Nations; a contemporary Saint George ready to slay the dragon. If only his message could reach everyone in the land!
A renewed spirit of resolve came over the campers. Fresh air and education and good fellowship were all very well, but there was important work to be done. Rumblings as to the likelihood of another continental war could no longer be ignored: all must do their bit. Educational talks were scheduled, every afternoon before tea. In attending these, Phyllis grew to have a deeper understanding of what the Party proposed. First and foremost, there would be no question of participating in any military engagement which did not directly threaten Britain or her Empire. Phyllis believed this very ardently. It was all right for her, of course: Edwin was only a boy. There was no question of him going off to war; he would not be old enough to serve, not for years and years. But her heart went out to other mothers, mothers of older sons. One or two of them spoke, as the campers sat listening on bales of hay. Their conviction and commitment to the cause of peace was very real. Many women would already have lost brothers, uncles, fathers – even, among the older generation, sweethearts – to the dreadful toll of the 1914–18 war. Another such conflict simply could not be countenanced. The path to a lasting peace was clear, as laid out by Mosley.
Like Italy and Germany, Britain must simply withdraw from the struggle for world markets and become self-sufficient, while developing her domestic and imperial resources. The interference of the League of Nations must be brought to an end.
It was agreed that small groups of the more senior officials should set out for neighbouring towns in the coming afternoons, in a drive to enlist fresh supporters. Interested parties would be invited to the camp for an afternoon of entertainment and informal education. It was an excellent advertisement for the cause: well-organized, onward-looking and peopled by enthusiasts of all ages. It made sense to drum up support at such a time as new recruits could observe for themselves the Party machine in its splendid operation. Cadets should also play their part. Julia and the girls she was bunking with were to hand out leaflets on the promenade at Worthing, while other groups of Cadets would be deployed to Bognor and Littlehampton. In their sharp uniforms the young would attract notice, distinct as they would look from the trippers. The handsome Freddy knew how to drive, so he and a couple of the other young men would take a group each, in cars borrowed from the more senior campers. If these lads turned the head of some passing young woman, so much the better.
Hugh had no need to be in London for the next fortnight and he planned to take advantage of his leisure by finding a suitable plot on which to construct a house. He had been drawing up plans, incorporating some of the features of continental property into his design. There would be a veranda along the garden side of the house, where cane furniture could be arranged so as to be able to take tea in the open air. Steps from this veranda would lead down to the lawn. More radically, he intended to install a shower over one of the baths, having acquired the habit from their years abroad. Phyllis interpolated an occasional suggestion, but the project was very much Hugh’s own.
‘You wouldn’t mind if Patricia joined me today, would you? Only she knows some people over at Littlehampton who might be amenable to selling building land.’
‘Of course not. Why don’t you ask her to stay on for supper, when I get back from camp? I’ve promised to help Nina with her interminable organizing this afternoon. She’s trying to vary the meal rota so that the longer-stay campers don’t keep getting corned beef hash.’
When Phyllis returned home she heard her sister’s voice through the open door to the drawing room.
‘… the thing with hydrangeas is that they look rather bedraggled unless one dead-heads immediately after flowering, but I do prefer them, all the same.’
‘D’you know, I think I’d really sooner pampas grass,’ said Hugh.
‘Well, you must do as you like, of course. I do feel the ornamental grasses are rather suburban.’
‘Hello darling.’ Phyllis went over to kiss her sister. ‘Did Hugh col
lect you? I didn’t see your car.’
‘Greville’s taken it to town,’ said Patricia.
‘I shan’t mind taking you home, after. It’s no bother,’ said Hugh.
‘I do think you might’ve told me about having dined at the Gordon-Cannings,’ said Patricia, turning to Phyllis.
Phyllis wished she wasn’t so prone to flushing. People took it as a sign of guilt, when it was much more often the result of a sense of injustice. ‘It made me look foolish in front of Tom,’ Patricia went on.
‘I’m sure it didn’t,’ said Phyllis. ‘I hardly even met him at the dinner, I was right up at the other end of the table. He wouldn’t have noticed me.’
‘Well, anyway, you should be a bit wary of Venetia. She’s tremendous fun, I know, but half of what she says is completely made up. I wouldn’t trust her as far as I could throw her, I mean.’
‘I wasn’t intending to confide in her,’ said Phyllis.
‘Well, no, why would you? It’s not as if you live a life of intrigue,’ said Patricia.
When they sat down to dine, Hugh told Phyllis the news. Her sister and himself had visited the chap at Littlehampton and he’d agreed to part with a parcel of land. It was barely a couple of hundred yards from the beach and of a size which would give them a large garden; they might even have a tennis court, certainly a vegetable plot. He hoped to be able to build in an east/west configuration, with the veranda and drawing room looking west so as to get the best of the late afternoon sun. The dining room too would be on this side, while a smaller breakfast room would be constructed off the hall, facing east. In the mornings Phyllis would be able to take her coffee and write her letters there; perhaps they might install a nice little sofa, too, where she might like to sew or read. He had thought of everything. There were already two or three houses going up nearby, of comparable size. There was to be a small private road to the houses, which would number no more than a dozen. Hugh considered the usual north/south aspect a mistake, because it meant one side of a property was always in gloom. It was the devil’s own job to find suitable plants for a north-facing wall: even a petiolaris couldn’t be relied upon. At this Patricia nodded sagely. The aspect of these other houses might mean that his would have to be constructed side-on to its driveway so as to sit well within its allocated plot, but he foresaw no problem with such an arrangement, albeit unconventional. Patricia could not agree with him on this point, for how would any visitor know which was the front and which the tradesman’s entrance? But Hugh would not be budged. Patricia teased him good-naturedly for being so stubborn. Phyllis listened to them talking, relieved that someone else was listening to Hugh’s plans.
After the Party Page 8