Britannia Mews

by Margery Sharp

  “You simply make no attempt at control,” said Mrs. Culver to Mrs. Hambro. “Alice is naturally obedient, and so gives no trouble; but the boys have got completely out of hand. Their father should whip them.”

  “We don’t believe in whipping,” said Mrs. Hambro.

  “You mean you don’t like whipping. I suppose no one does. But what would become of the world if we none of us did our duty just because it was unpleasant? When Addie didn’t want to have her ears pierced, it would have been much pleasanter for me to give way to her; but it had to be done, and it was done, and no nonsense. As for the twins—”

  “Don’t tell me, dear, I know it,” begged Mrs. Hambro. “They’re a plague, and the Porters will never dine with us again. But if you had six children instead of two—”

  “I should know how to keep them in order,” said Mrs. Culver positively.

  The sisters were not much alike, and their husbands remarkably dissimilar. Mr. Hambro was a silk merchant, and though this was practically being in trade, never tried to conceal the fact; he made a habit of bringing home City friends, and freely, if dryly, advised lady guests on the respective qualities of moire and surah. But Mr. Culver associated himself with the publishing house of Culver, Blore and Masterman merely because it was a family business. Old Mr. Culver had founded it, and done well out of evangelical pamphlets; Masterman brought in scholastic text-books, and Blore a series of didactic Lives. Should any misguided author submit a novel, it was returned unread: Culver, Blore and Masterman were not interested in fiction. Few commercial ventures were accompanied by so little risk, or brought in such steady profits; but William Culver found it necessary to buttress a naturally cautious spirit by cultivating detachment. He refused all contact with printers (a notoriously turbulent set) and rarely saw even a hack author; but he was great on Latin primers, and popularly supposed to work out every problem in every fresh edition of the Algebra for Lower Forms. At home he left the direction of the household entirely to his wife, and when the children had measles went to stay at his Club. Mrs. Culver’s social activity rather irked him than otherwise, but she told him so often it was necessary to keep up appearances that he had come to believe her.

  Adelaide and Treff did not see much of their father. Neither parent, indeed, played so large a part in their lives as either Miss Bryant or their cousins. But everyone knew Treff was Mrs. Culver’s favourite, and Adelaide early accepted the fact. As she grew older she naturally spent more time in her mother’s company; but it might fairly be said that the acquaintance did not ripen.

  8

  In 1880 occurred the major event of this period: the Culvers moved from Albion Place to Kensington. Albion Place was going down. The proximity of the Mews, perhaps of the Edgware Road, infected its gentility; trade, in the person of a wine merchant, moved in to Number 5; and for all these reasons, or perhaps for none, the shifting sunlight of fashion passed on. The house in Kensington, near the Hambros’, was smarter though smaller; there was no stabling, so Mrs. Culver at last gave up her carriage and jobbed a brougham instead. But one link with Albion Place remained, or was rather reforged: Adelaide’s twenty-first birthday present from her father was a series of drawing-lessons from a Mr. Lambert, who taught at a near-by school for girls. He was looking for a lodging—a very cheap lodging, said Mr. Lambert unashamedly, a couple of rooms in a central slum—and asked Mrs. Culver’s advice. With a certain irony she recommended Britannia Mews; she had not, she said, a very wide experience of slums. The young man, however, not only went to look at the Mews, but found there just what he wanted. Number 2, once occupied by the Bensons, was empty, and he moved in on the first of October, 1885.

  CHAPTER II

  1

  “Adelaide, are you coming calling with me?” asked Mrs. Culver.

  “I can’t, Mamma. It’s my drawing-lesson.”

  Mrs. Culver looked at her daughter with a frown. It was of course quite proper that Adelaide should remember the lesson that her father had so kindly paid for, but at the same time she ought to have shown more regret at not going out with her mother. It was a sort of remissness to which Adelaide was particularly prone.

  “I sometimes think,” said Mrs. Culver, “that you don’t care whether you come with me or not.”

  “Of course I do, Mamma. I don’t much care for the calls; they’re so boring.”

  “You girls talk far too much about being bored,” said Mrs. Culver severely. “What is there boring, pray, about going to see Mrs. Orton?”

  Adelaide was silent. Silence was one of her outstanding characteristics—and how unfortunately, since she had turned out only moderately good-looking. If you were beautiful and silent you could pass for statuesque; the average girl was expected to be bright. But Adelaide couldn’t produce brightness at Mrs. Orton’s: as she had once tried to explain to Alice, she couldn’t possibly say anything when no one said anything to her.…

  “But they do!” protested Alice. Bright herself, as well as pretty, she was always an immense success at the tea-table. “I often see people talking to you!”

  “But they don’t say anything,” explained Adelaide glumly. “They just ask me if I’ve seen The Mikado.”

  “Well, what do you want them to talk about?”

  “I don’t know,” said Adelaide.

  If she couldn’t explain to Alice, she certainly couldn’t explain to her mother: the desire to get below the surface of things, to discover what life was really about, was apparently unknown in Culver circles. Adelaide sometimes wondered whether all their acquaintances were not suffering from the same unacknowledged hunger—whether their polite chit-chat did not mask a universal desire for some more genuine communion; on the whole she thought it unlikely. Only once had she glimpsed any sign of such an attitude, and that was in a girl called Agatha Yates, who had been to Queen’s College. Adelaide saw Miss Yates, at an At Home, collar a middle-aged gentleman and begin talking to him about rent collection: they were soon deep in argument, impervious to the ironic glances of all the other ladies present, and as she left Miss Yates said loudly, “Well, this has been worth while!” Very rude, of course, but Adelaide could not help envying her. She wished she had been clever enough to go to Queen’s College herself—though it probably wouldn’t have been allowed.…

  “Well, I suppose I must make your excuses,” said Mrs. Culver. “I shall give Mrs. Orton your love.”

  “Yes, do,” said Adelaide. She was so used to having bits of her love left here and there, like a card with the corner turned down, that the word had lost all significance.

  2

  The two cousins took drawing-lessons together—and indeed Alice’s father paid half. When they began, a few months earlier, the Hambros still had their Miss Grigson, and she acted as chaperone; when she left it was decided that the girls could chaperone each other. Alice always arrived before Mr. Lambert and stayed to tea afterwards. To-day Adelaide hoped she would come early, for Mrs. Culver had a lunch engagement, and announced that after it she would do a little shopping in the West End (see what Adelaide was missing!) and go straight on to her calls. Adelaide saw her mother off and sat down to solitary cold mutton with a pleasing sensation of independence. She determined that if Alice came in time, they would have black coffee.

  But two o’clock struck, and quarter-past, and still no Alice. Mr. Lambert was due at two-thirty. At twenty minutes past, there was a ring at the door; Adelaide flew from the dining-room to open it, and there stood a Hambro twin.

  “Oh, dear!” cried Adelaide, at once scenting disaster. “Can’t Alice come?”

  “She’s sorry, she’s got her autumn cold,” announced Jimmy Hambro stolidly. “She’s streaming.”

  “Oh, dear!” cried Adelaide again. “Poor thing! But—oh, dear!—what about Mr. Lambert?”

  “Johnny’s gone with a note to put him off. We tossed up.”

  The twins were a great convenience to the Hambro family. At twelve, and of the male sex, they were considered competent to pen
etrate London in almost any direction: they carried notes and messages, fetched parcels, ran for cabs. They were much more useful than Treff had ever been, and Adelaide as a rule was quite fond of them; but now in her deep disappointment she did not even ask James if he would like to come in. It was all she could do to send Alice her best love.

  “She sent hers,” agreed Jimmy, and paused. He, too, seemed to have his preoccupations. He said, “Are you going to write to Treff?”

  “I expect so,” said Adelaide. Treff was at Harrow; during term-time she was supposed to write to him once a week, and did so about once a fortnight.

  “You might tell him we’ve got the Prince Albert working.”

  Adelaide vaguely remembered that this was an elaborate model steamboat bought by Treff for two pounds, and subsequently sold to the twins as a derelict for seven and six.

  “Of course I will, dear. I’m sure he’ll be very glad.”

  “We think he’ll be sick as mud,” said Jimmy dispassionately—and stumped off down the steps.

  Adelaide closed the door and stood there in the hall feeling extraordinarily flat. How long, how empty, an afternoon now stretched before her! How steep was the drop from expectancy to disappointment! And how unreasonable! For what had she missed? A drawing-lesson, and Alice’s company; shopping and calls with Mrs. Culver; the merest recurrent commonplaces. Yet she felt life ebbing away; the very house, at that moment, felt uninhabited, like a house one comes back to after the holidays. Too depressed even to walk upstairs, Adelaide sat down on the oak chest—it held winter blankets; open the lid an inch and you released a strong smell of moth-balls—and gave herself up to a mood which during the past year had become more and more familiar. She thought of it as “the Hollows,” because when she slipped into it she felt completely empty, undirected and purposeless: a dumb creature awaiting unimagined assuagement. At first she had put it down to lack of Faith: she had tried to acquire Faith by going every morning to early service at St. Mark’s. Apart from annoying the maids, who had to call her specially early, it produced no result. Adelaide was left with an alarm clock. Would higher education have helped? Possibly, thought Adelaide, remembering Miss Yates; but it was too late for that now. Family affection, then? Alas, when Adelaide followed this line she discovered only a feeling of guilt; it was so evident that she did not love Papa and Mamma and Treff nearly so much as she ought. Sometimes, from the depths of her mind, there even rose the shocking cry I don’t love them at all—but that Adelaide hastily stifled. It was wicked. She thought: I love Alice. I love Alice dearly.…

  Unconsciously she pressed her hands tightly to her breast. Through the slate-blue merino she could feel a light movement: the beating of her heart.

  3

  When the door-bell rang again Adelaide started as though from sleep—back to full consciousness, back to the thought, What will Rose think if she sees me sitting here? But Rose the parlour-maid did not appear, she was probably changing her dress, and after a brief hesitation Adelaide opened the door herself. The person outside was Mr. Lambert.

  For a moment she could only stare speechlessly. To her horror, because she was startled and confused, she felt the blood rise to her cheeks. The drawing-master looked at her in surprise.

  “Mayn’t I come in?” he asked.

  “Of course,” said Adelaide quickly, and stepping back. “Only I thought—I wasn’t expecting—didn’t Johnny Hambro bring you a note?”

  “What note?” asked Mr. Lambert. He was still looking at her with peculiar intentness, as though she were a drawing to be corrected; he had remarkably bright brown eyes under rather arched eyebrows.

  “Oh, dear!” said Adelaide. At that moment she heard the service-door open; over her shoulder she saw Rose bounce into the hall and bounce back; most unfortunate. “A note from my aunt,” she went on hastily, “from Mrs. Hambro. Alice has a bad cold.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” said Mr. Lambert obtusely.

  “So you see, there isn’t a drawing-lesson. I can’t think how Johnny missed you.”

  “I had probably started before he got there. I walked across the Gardens.”

  “Mamma’s out too,” said Adelaide.

  “Well, haven’t you any drawings for me to see?” asked Mr. Lambert—and calmly stepping into the hall, hung up his hat.

  The coolness of this action—but it wasn’t cool, it was simply matter-of-fact—put Adelaide in a most awkward position. Should she explain again that there was no drawing-lesson because Alice couldn’t come, and she was therefore unchaperoned? In the face of his extremely businesslike air this seemed absurd—indeed the whole matter of being chaperoned was absurd, girls like Agatha Yates never gave it a thought. So swiftly reflected Adelaide (to whom a moment before Mrs. Hambro’s note seemed the most natural thing in the world) and with a calmness equalling (she hoped) his own, she led Mr. Lambert upstairs into the back drawing-room.

  Her portfolio was there ready; Adelaide untied it and took out her week’s work: a neatly executed copy of a Landseer dog, and an original still-life, of pears. Mr. Lambert sat down to examine them; Adelaide stood docile at his shoulder. The back drawing-room, overlooking a small paved yard, was always very quiet, and to-day seemed quieter than usual—though in fact the only sound missing was Alice’s breathing. It was strange what a difference her absence made. If anyone had asked Adelaide whether she had ever been alone with a young man before, she would at once have replied Yes, of course, dozens of times; but all these occasions had been at dances, at picnics, in public and liable to interruption. Even in a conservatory there was always another couple on the other side of the palm. Adelaide, however, was peculiarly conscious of being alone with Mr. Lambert. She looked down at the top of his head—he had very thick, springy hair—and was more aware of male proximity than even in the arms of a dancing-partner. It was inexplicable.… I do hope I haven’t got Alice’s cold! thought Adelaide—for she really felt slightly feverish.

  Mr. Lambert meanwhile continued to examine the drawings. He looked at the pears so long, without speaking, that Adelaide now began to wonder whether she had accidentally achieved a masterpiece; but his expression, as he suddenly pushed the paper aside, was inscrutable. No criticism apparently was forthcoming. Adelaide rather uncertainly came from behind his chair and sat down as usual with her sketch-book before her. It opened at a half-finished pastel of Alice; the girls had been using each other as models.

  “I can’t go on with this, Alice isn’t here.”

  “No,” said Mr. Lambert vaguely. He picked up a crayon and gave Alice a more convincing eye; eyes were always the difficulty. Then he let the crayon drop, let his hand drop; and it dropped upon Adelaide’s.

  Adelaide’s course was perfectly clear; she should have removed her hand at once. But Mr. Lambert (though he was pressing it so firmly as to make removal difficult) seemed unaware of what he had done. Moreover, his next words were at least as startling as his action.

  “You can’t want to go on with that awful thing.…”

  “Awful?” repeated Adelaide blankly. The shock was now double; but she couldn’t deal with both aspects at once. “Oh, Mr. Lambert, do you really think it’s awful?”

  “It’s terrible,” said Mr. Lambert.

  “But you said last week—you said last week it was good!”

  “I was lying,” said Mr. Lambert simply.

  Adelaide flushed. Even with her hand so astonishingly in his, she retained her strong sense of commercial morality.

  “If you don’t think I’ve any talent, you shouldn’t have gone on teaching me. You told Mamma I had talent. If that was untrue and—and it’s all just a waste of time, I shall tell Papa and he can stop paying for my lessons.”

  She was pleased to see Mr. Lambert look really startled. He let go her hand, and took up the chalk again, but still kept his eyes on her face. Adelaide felt a pleasing sense of power.

  “Whether Alice has more talent than I have,” she went on angrily, “of course I can’
t judge. And as your judgment seems hardly to be trusted, I shouldn’t think she’d want to go on with her lessons either. If we’ve simply been made fools of—”

  “Adelaide,” said Mr. Lambert softly.

  She paused. Her indignant glance wavered. She felt she had perhaps gone too far.

  “I’d rather die than hurt your feelings,” said Mr. Lambert earnestly. “I’ve hated to deceive you—”

  “But you have!” cried Adelaide.

  “Can’t you guess why?”

  Long afterwards, Adelaide was astonished at the rapidity with which she did guess. Only half an hour before she could honestly have sworn that the idea of Mr. Lambert as a lover had never entered her mind; now, in a moment, as though he had thrown off a cloak of invisibility—there he was. She had a lover, and he was Mr. Lambert. Mr. Lambert was in love with her. As her face showed, Adelaide was astounded, electrified, but not for one instant incredulous.

  “I may have told a few lies,” went on the drawing-master, more confidently, “but if I didn’t how the deuce was I to see you? I’m not the sort of man Mrs. Culver asks to dinner. Whereas by giving you lessons I was certain of once a week … Are you still angry?”

  Adelaide shook her head. These revelations were too delicious to interrupt.

  “Thank heaven for that.” Mr. Lambert sighed deeply and picked up her hand again with great naturalness. “Has any one ever told you you’re very beautiful?”

  “No,” said Adelaide. “And I’m not.”

  “To an artist you are,” said Mr. Lambert firmly. “You’re like a Holbein. You’re also rather like the Sleeping Princess.”

  This should have been warning enough, but Adelaide was unused to love-making. When Mr. Lambert drew her gently to her feet and stood looking at her in the moment before he kissed her, she perceived neither his intent nor his hesitation. It was the moment to give a rebuff; but Adelaide stood passive and he kissed her on the mouth. When he let her go she knew that she was in love with him.