The Daughters of Mrs Peacock

by Gerald Bullet

  ‘Just a cup of tea,’ said Uncle Tom, ‘before I take the road. No time for more. And thank you, Julia my dear,’ he continued warmly, beaming upon his sister-in-law, ‘for my delightful visit.’

  ‘But, Thomas,’ Emily protested, ‘you’re not thinking of leaving us so soon!’

  ‘Must make an early start, don’t you know. Long way to go before nightfall.’

  ‘But the birthday, Uncle Tom!’ cried Julia. ‘It’s not for a week yet, and that’s what you came for.’

  ‘Catherine’s birthday,’ said Sarah. ‘Her twenty-first.’

  ‘The Catherine they allude to, Tom,’ explained Edmund, ‘is a niece of yours, and our youngest daughter.’

  ‘This one, Uncle,’ said Catherine, pointing at herself. ‘Me. The redhead.’

  Mrs Peacock corrected her. ‘Auburn, my dear.’

  ‘Ah yes,’ said Uncle Tom. ‘Sweet Auburn, loveliest village of the plain. That reminds me. I’ve something for you, Catherine. With my best love. Now where did I put it? He jumped up, pushing back the chair, and after a surprisingly brief search in his pockets produced a cheque. ‘There you are, my dear. Buy yourself a trinket.’

  ‘Oh, Uncle! How kind of you!’ All joined in the chorus of thanks. ‘But you will stay for my birthday, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course. Of course. Wouldn’t miss it for the world.’ Divesting himself of his outdoor coverings, and dropping them on the floor, he resumed his seat and settled down to enjoy his breakfast.

  That was Uncle Tom. Everyone rejoiced in him: even the servants to whom his untidiness gave so much trouble, and even Emily, shocked though she sometimes was by his unconventional manners. To the girls and their father his elderly innocence was a continual feast.

  And what of Mrs Peacock? Was not her side of the family to be represented at the dinner party? Indeed it was. There was her brother, Uncle Richard Bartlow, and there were the Druids. Uncle Richard was a dried-up but genial little man who, having no taste or talent for farming, had gravitated to London. He now occupied a commanding position, monarch of all he surveyed, in Threadneedle Street: according to his brother-in-law Edmund, no one dared approach him without murmurings of apology and ritual genuflexions. Having no nearer kin, for he was married only to his career, he duly arrived on the morning of the great day. So, a little later, did Uncle Druid, garrulously explaining, with the support of many a sagacious proverb, why Aunt Bertha, his son Barnabas, and his daughter Patience, who sent their fondest love, were unable to accompany him. So too did Edward Linton, his perverseness in proposing to the wrong girl now fully forgiven. The Claybrook brothers, who though not family might some day become so, were expected in the evening.

  Laden with gifts and good wishes, the guests arrived. Catherine by now was unbearably excited. But for one circumstance, which she hardly dared think about but could not for a moment forget, the birthday promised to be all she could wish for.

  They were eleven at table, a predominantly male party. The seven men included Edmund and three uncles, all of whom, being unmarriageable, were nothing to Mrs Peacock’s purpose. Sarah’s Edward being already bespoken, her only hope, and that a slender one, was the Claybrooks. She observed with satisfaction that dear Catherine, in her new evening gown, was looking prettier than ever, her cheeks delicately flushed, her eyes sparkling. As for the absence of aunts, that could not be helped and was anyhow no great matter. She was annoyed with Bertha Druid for not coming, and still more for sending Mr Druid in her place, for she had difficulty in accepting him as belonging to the family; but Jane and Clara, who were elderly and ailing, the only other survivors of a numerous brood, she had not expected; and Edmund-it had been part of his attraction for her—possessed no sisters. She gazed upon her guests with a benign complacency, only regretting that she had allowed herself to be talked out of sending an invitation to the Manor. Such a handsome fellow, Arthur Beckoning, and so well connected. The very thing for Catherine.

  Seven tall candles—it had been Edmund’s whim to leave the lamps unlit—created a glowing island of intimacy. Their soft lustre, reflected in silver and glass, lit up the eleven expectant faces. Elsewhere in the room firelight contended with the surrounding shadows. In the centre of the long table stood a bowl in which, bedded in moss, Christmas roses bloomed: emblem, thought Mrs Peacock, recalling something she had read, of that purity by which she set so much store. They had been Julia’s idea: Julia, the one daughter on whose loyalty she could utterly rely. She did not know what a pang it had cost Julia to refrain from proposing that Dr Witherby should be invited.

  ‘The festive board,’ said Uncle Druid, rubbing his hands together, ‘maketh glad the heart of man, as the Good Book says. And woman too, eh Emily? Woman too,’ he repeated, feeling within him the birth-pangs of a new thought. ‘Male and female,’ he announced triumphantly, ‘created he them. That’s how it is. Am I right, Edmund?’

  ‘Incontestably, my dear sir. It’s an eccentric arrangement, but it has its advantages. Our Catherine, for example. Here’s wishing you joy, my love.’ He raised his glass.

  ‘Joy!’ echoed a chorus of voices.

  ‘And security,’ said Uncle Richard. ‘Gilt-edged.’

  The felicitations over, Uncle Druid was again moved to unburden his mind of its accumulating treasure.

  ‘A body’s birthday,’ said Uncle Druid, with emphatic deliberation, ‘comes but once a year. It is meet, therefore, that we should be merry.’

  ‘Within reason,’ remarked Uncle Richard. ‘Always within reason. A very sound vintage, this, Edmund. Full-bodied. Mellow. Delicate bouquet.’

  ‘Glad you like it, Dick. Made from grapes, they tell me.’

  ‘Comes but once a year,’ repeated Uncle Druid, holding in mid-air his fork, on which was impaled a brussels sprout. ‘But the twenty-first birthday, be you man or be you woman, comes but once in a lifetime. Here today and gone tomorrow, as the saying is. There’s a thought for you there, Catherine.’

  ‘Yes, Uncle. So there is.’

  ‘A wine like this,’ said Uncle Richard, ‘is a sound investment.’

  ‘In a year from now,’ said Uncle Druid, ‘you’ll be twenty-two. Think of that.’

  ‘Pays good dividends,’ said Uncle Richard.

  ‘And this time last year, Uncle Druid,’ said Sarah, ‘the poor little thing was only twenty.’

  ‘True, my dear. Very true. And there’s a lesson in that, too.’

  ‘An arithmetic lesson,’ murmured Edward.

  ‘Thomas, you’re not eating,’ said Mrs Peacock. ‘Wake up, do.’

  ‘Eh? What’s that? Dear me, I fear I was dreaming.’

  ‘Dreaming of his bicycle, Mama,’ said Catherine. ‘Is it quite happy, do you think, Uncle Tom? Oughtn’t we to take it something to eat?’

  Uncle Tom smiled vaguely. ‘I was trying to recall a saying of St Bernard’s. But for the moment it eludes me. Must be getting old.’

  ‘Time flies,’ said Uncle Druid. ‘We all get older, even the youngest of us. Day after day, week after week, year after year. Take your Cousin Barnabas now, Catherine. Your Cousin Barnabas, Sarah. He’s older than he was. Close on forty, his mother tells me.’

  ‘Fancy that!’ said Julia sympathetically.

  ‘Yes, Julia my dear. Your Cousin Barnabas. And only yesterday, it seems, he was cutting, as they say, his first tooth.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Mr Peacock, ‘there’s a deal of dillwater has flowed under the bridges since then, eh Druid?’

  ‘I don’t get older,’ said Will Claybrook, ‘and don’t intend to. Never better in me life. How about you, Jack?’

  ‘Same here,’ said Jack, busily munching. ‘Good fodder. Healthy life. Plenty of hard work. Sleep like a baby.’

  ‘Tip of my tongue,’ said Uncle Tom. ‘It’s in the De baptismo. Very apt to the occasion. Perhaps you can help me, Linton? St Bernard of Clairvaux, you know.’

  ‘Not I, sir,’ said Edward. ‘The only St Bernard I ever knew had four legs.’

  ‘A g
ood dog,’ said Uncle Druid, ‘is a man’s best friend, I always say. Bar his mother, mark you. Bar his mother. Dead and gone now these many years, poor dear soul. Take my old sheepdog now. Jack we call him. No offence to you, Mr Claybrook, and none taken I hope. I’ve had him for years and his dam before him, and that’s not swearing, Emily, dear lady, it’s a manner of speaking, as you might say his mother. Violent speech was never my way. I’ll tell you what that dog’s got,’ said Uncle Druid generously, ‘and I daresay it will surprise you. He’s got wisdom, he’s got understanding, he’s got loyalty. Bring ‘em along, Jack, I say. And what does he do?’

  ‘He brings them along?’ suggested Edward diffidently.

  ‘Sure enough,’ declared Uncle Druid, ‘he brings them along. Bring ‘em along, Jack, I say, but don’t hustle them. They’re mortal creatures, I say, like you and me, Jack, like all of us. And what does he do?’ He paused for dramatic effect, then said, making eyes of wonder: ‘He brings them along. A bark here. A snap there. But all as mild as a nodding nursemaid.’

  ‘A most sagacious animal,’ said Mr Peacock. ‘It would be a privilege to meet him. Come, Tom. Drink up, man. Or I shall think Cambridge has corrupted you.’

  ‘I believe you, Edmund,’ said Uncle Druid. ‘We understand each other, him and me.’

  ‘Very gratifying,’ said Edmund, hovering at hand with the decanter. ‘Let me give you some more wine, my dear fellow. It may loosen your tongue.’

  ‘Faithful and true, that dog is, and never a flea worth speaking of. There’s many a lesson we could learn from the likes of him.’

  He emptied his refilled glass, nodded at the company, and lapsed into silence with a sense of duty well done.

  Catherine, as the feast moved to its conclusion, became conscious of an inward trembling. Now was the moment. She braced herself for a great effort.

  ‘Is anything the matter, Catherine dear?’

  ‘Nothing at all, Mama.’

  ‘You look pale. Are you feeling quite well?’

  ‘Perfectly, thank you. Papa, may I ask you a question?’

  ‘Eh? Certainly, my love. I am all attention.’

  ‘It’s on a point of law,’ said Catherine. The trembling had subsided. Her voice was steady and clear. ‘Am I right in believing that now I’m twenty-one you are no longer legally responsible for me?’

  ‘That, in a strict sense, is true. What a singular question!’

  ‘And that from now on I can do what I like?’

  ‘You are still your father’s daughter, my dear,’ said Mrs Peacock.

  ‘Yes, Mama. I’m not questioning that. What I mean is that if I were to disobey him he couldn’t, legally I mean, lock me up in my room, as oldfashioned fathers used to do. That is so, isn’t it, Papa?’

  ‘Near enough, Kitty. Near enough. And by the same token it might be argued that I’m relieved, by your great age, of the obligation to feed and clothe and house you. If you’re interested I’ll take counsel’s opinion on the point. But I’ll tell you here and now, for your reassurance, that I have no immediate intention of standing on my legal rights, whatever they may be. Your sisters, you will have noticed, are still with us, though both are of age. So pray compose yourself, my dear. You need have no fear I shall starve you

  ‘Nor lock me up either?’ said Catherine.

  ‘Nor lock you up either, dear child. I think I can safely promise that.’

  ‘Would it amount to assault and battery, do you think, Papa? Or would they call it false imprisonment?’

  ‘That again is a point I shall have to look up. At the moment I can recall no precedent.’

  ‘When you’ve quite finished talking nonsense …’ said Mrs Peacock, rising.

  All the men, except Uncle Tom, scrambled to their feet.

  ‘Just a minute, Mama.’ Catherine, too, stood up. ‘There’s something you ought to know, you and Papa. And Uncle Tom. And … everybody.’

  ‘Well, Catherine?’

  Everyone was looking at her.

  ‘Please don’t make a fuss, because it’s quite decided,’ said Catherine. ‘I’m going to marry Robert Crabbe.’

  ‘Tut!’ exclaimed Uncle Tom. ‘What a duffer I am! It’s not in the De baptismo at all. It’s in the De gradibus humilitatis. Let me see now, how does it run? Just give me a moment.’

  They gave him more than a moment. The silence painfully lengthened while Mrs Peacock, frozen with anger, recovered her power of speech.

  ‘Fortunately, Catherine, I did not hear what you said. And I forbid you to repeat it.’

  ‘Just as you like, Mama.’

  ‘Edmund!’

  ‘Yes, Emily?’

  ‘Have you nothing to say to Catherine?’

  ‘Nothing at the moment, my dear. Unless you wish me to felicitate her?’

  ‘You heard what she said?’

  ‘Very distinctly. And as you, I understand, did not, I will rehearse it for you. She has decided, she says, to marry Robert Crabbe.’

  ‘In the spring, Mama,’ said Catherine, ‘if you’ll have me till then. If not, we can make it next week.’

  ‘Be quiet, Catherine. The subject is closed. You know perfectly well your father will never consent.’

  ‘My consent, Emily, as Kitty has been careful to establish, is no longer required. It’s checkmate, my dear. And as neat a one as I’ve seen.’

  ‘Very well, Edmund. Then you must disinherit her. There’s no law against that.’

  ‘True. But the gesture would lack humour, I feel. Believe me, my dear Emily, our best plan by far is to try to look pleasant about it, since the young lady has made up her mind.’ He met Emily’s basilisk look with his most charming smile. ‘Edward, my dear fellow, may I trouble you to fetch the port decanter? You’ll find it on the sideboard.’

  ‘With pleasure, sir. This port, I conjecture,’ remarked Edward, returning to the table, ‘is older even than Catherine.’

  Mrs Peacock, magnificent in defeat, said smoothly, all trace of anger gone:

  ‘Come along, girls. Let us leave the gentlemen to their wine.’

  Chapter Nine

  Epilogue

  On an afternoon in 1919, and out of uniform at last, Nicholas Crabbe, sole surviving member of the firm of Peacock and Crabbe, formerly of Newtonbury but now and for many years functioning solely from Lincoln’s Inn Fields, lifted the shining brass knocker of his grandmother’s house and performed with it a delicate tattoo. While he stood, waiting, a great load of time seemed to drop from his middle-aged shoulders. Hardly more than five years had passed since his last visit, but the scene was saturated in the quality of a much earlier time, when his mother, who was now seventy, had been young and gay. Gay she still was at moments, in spite of what the war had done to her; her courage was a constant marvel to him; and but for Aunt Julia’s dissuasion—‘Such an ordeal for you, Kitty, with your poor sciatica!’—she would have been with him today. Nicholas was the youngest of three, and the only survivor, his brothers Edmund and Thomas having by understating their ages contrived to get themselves killed in Flanders. His mother and Aunt Julia, Uncle Witherby’s widow, now shared a house with Aunt Julia’s Emily, not too far from where Aunt Sarah and Uncle Edward lived, with their children and grandchildren at no insuperable distance. Dutifully, having a strong sense of family, he had visited them all within a week or two of his demobilization; and now it was Granny Peacock’s turn. Granny Peacock, full of years, by whose stubbornness even Death himself was daunted.

  The door opened. A pair of startled, incredulous eyes stared at him.

  ‘Hullo, Miff-Miff! How are you? I’m Nicholas Crabbe, in case you don’t remember.’

  ‘Mr Nicholas! How nice! As if I could forget!’

  If anyone could make Nicholas Crabbe feel like a boy again it was Miss Smith. Here she was, in her eighties, the same as ever: still straight as a rod, still neat and prim, her mid-parted Quakerish hair still the colour of bleached straw, her long face—empty of all but kindliness—making her look, as to hi
m she had always looked, like a sentimental goat.

  ‘Come along in now and rest yourself,’ she said anxiously. ‘I’m sure you must be tired after your long journey. Mrs Peacock will be pleased.’

  ‘Will she? I wonder. How is she, Miffy?’

  ‘Pretty well on the whole,’ said Mary Smith. ‘She has, you know, her ups and downs.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Nicholas.

  While the talk ran on he was aware, as never before, of Mary Smith and her story, too placid for pathos. It had been her destiny, cheerfully embraced, to live always at second hand, ministering to others: first as nursery governess, and then, and for something like thirty years, as companion to a tatchety old woman. She had lived from day to day, from week to week, never looking far ahead, and the years had gone by unnoticed, bringing quarrels and discontents, he surmised, but no decisive reason for making a change, even had that been possible. At intervals, so he had heard, there had been angry talk, on both sides, of her going; but nothing came of it, nor ever would. She had in fact nowhere to go; and since no one but Mrs Peacock now had need of her, what could she do but stay?

  ‘So the old lady’s pretty well, is she?’

  ‘She’s wonderful for her age, is dear Mrs Peacock. She has her cough of course. The tubes aren’t what they were, doctor says. And she gets a little mixed in her thoughts. You mustn’t mind that, Mr Nicholas. It’s only to be expected at ninety-five.’

  ‘Yes indeed,’ said Nicholas.

  A long silence paid tribute to the miracle of Mrs Peacock’s longevity.

  ‘You shall see her presently, when she’s had her rest. She’ll be ever so delighted. And now you’ll be ready for a cup of tea, I’m sure. I’ll go and tell Violet. She’s getting your room ready. Such a treat for her.’

  Left to himself, he turned back into the small square entrance hall which he knew so well and had remembered so often. The rose-coloured fanlight over the front door shed a warm illumination into the red-carpeted room, to mingle with the plain daylight filtering in through the glass doors opposite, which gave on to the garden. Standing in this quiet neutral interior with the street door at his back and a vision of lawn and trees and October sky confronting him, he felt himself to be at the very centre and heart of his grandmother’s habitual being. The house was rather smaller than he had remembered it, but otherwise still the same: the same taste and smell; the same colour; the same tall gravely-ticking clock, whose face was that of an old friend; the same enclosed pocket of unchanging time.