“Well...” Quentin was momentarily stumped. He would have liked to mention his three-volume novel, or riding out on Satan in the hope of glimpsing the doctor - then inspiration struck. “Father has importuned me to take his place in the quoits tournament. I have to practice.”
Aunt Fanny guffawed in surprise before mastering her amusement and thumping the desk. “Don’t be so absurd! Quoits tournament!”
“It is Father’s wish.”
“Your father-” Aunt Fanny cut herself short. “Never mind. You may practice that damned silly game to your heart’s content this afternoon. This morning you shall attend me and My Lady Garden and shall be perfectly charming to her daughter, whatever-her-name-may-be.”
“To what end, Aunt?”
“O, you really are a cotton-headed imbecile. To the end of your single life, your bachelor existence, you obtuse ninny.”
“But-” Quentin floundered.
“Eleven o’clock sharp. Have Birkworth arrange bread and butter and so forth.”
She dismissed him with a flick of her hand and he stomped out, his rage taking him out of the house and halfway to the stable before he realised where he was going. How easy it would be to mount Satan and gallop away from this hell on Earth never to return!
“Morning, sir.” It was the stable boy, crossing the yard with a grin on his face. What had he to be so pleased about? “Riding today?”
“What? Um... no. I mean not yet.”
“You look proper vexed, sir - if you don’t mind my saying-so.”
“O! Vexed is only the half of it. Do you know, they are trying to marry me off?”
Francis looked stricken. “Be they now? Who to?”
“Some girl! Can you imagine?”
“I prefer not to, sir.”
Both young men shuddered.
“And you’ve never fancied it yourself? Getting married? To a girl?”
“Who, sir? Me, sir? No, sir! I’m not what you call the marrying sort, sir.”
Quentin’s eyes narrowed. “What mean you by that?”
“I’m a servant, sir. It’s not allowed.”
“O! Oh, yes. Quite.” Having been reminded of the other’s low station, Quentin took a sudden step backwards to distance himself from the stable boy. “I cannot stand around talking to you all day.”
“I won’t keep you, sir.” Francis touched the brim of his cap. Neither of them moved.
“Have Satan ready at two,” Quentin muttered at last.
“Right you are, sir.”
“On the dot.”
“Two o’clock it is, sir.”
“Good.”
“Well, sir.”
Finally, Quentin turned and strode back to the house. In his room, he considered giving the beekeeper’s helmet another airing - anything to put off Lady Garden and her damnable daughter.
***
The great clock in the hall struck the hour of eleven. Quentin in stiff collar and his best frock coat, stood at the drawing-room window, while Aunt Fanny sat in the Squire’s armchair, her hands resting on the head of a cane.
“Tardiness is insupportable,” she muttered.
“I am here already, Aunt,” Quentin pointed out.
“I am sure My Lady Garden is more orderly than this. I suspect the daughter, Whatshername, is at fault.”
“Ah, look, a carriage!” Quentin was pleased to have an end to his aunt’s complaining but dismayed that the experience was about to take place after all. He braced himself for the onslaught of female society.
Presently, Birkworth slipped in and announced the guests.
“The Lady Garden and Rose,” he intoned, withdrawing quickly.
“Rose Garden!” Quentin exclaimed. Aunt Fanny, getting to her feet, shot him a withering stare.
Lady Garden was a small woman, under the brim of a broad hat. She extended a gloved hand to Aunt Fanny who clasped it and invited the visitor to be seated. She nodded to Quentin to perform the same office for the daughter.
Miss Garden was the opposite of her mother. Tall where she was short, and broad where she was narrow. Where the mother was decorous, the daughter was unbecoming. Where Lady Garden was delicate, Miss Rose was a lumbering ox of a girl. She offered an arm like a tree’s bough to Quentin, dwarfing him completely.
Quentin led her to a chair and, once she was settled, scooted around to Aunt Fanny’s armchair for protection.
“How lovely to see you,” said Aunt Fanny. “Do feel free to divest yourself of that charming hat.”
“No,” said Lady Garden.
“And are you well, My Lady?” Aunt Fanny essayed to peer under the brim.
“I have been worse,” Lady Garden admitted but did not expand.
Aunt Fanny signalled with her eyes for Quentin to initiate conversation with the girl.
“Are you well, Miss Garden?” he managed to get out of his constricted throat. Miss Garden issued a grunt that may have been an answer in the affirmative or the negative, he couldn’t tell.
“I am quite well,” he announced to the room. No one responded. After a painful moment of silence, he twitched toward the door. “I shall see if Birkworth-”
“You shall remain here,” thundered Aunt Fanny. “But you may ring the bell.”
There was no need. Birkworth reappeared with a brace of serving maids behind him, wheeling in a trolley laden with a tea service and plates of delicacies.
Aunt Fanny and Quentin bore fixed smiles as the servants set out the elevenses. Lady Garden’s expression was concealed in millinery shadow; daughter Rose watched the refreshments with the avid eye of a predator.
The servants withdrew.
“Tea, My Lady?”
“Indeed,” said Lady Garden.
“Quentin shall pour.”
“Shall I, indeed?” A steely glare answered his question. He picked up the tea pot and the milk jug and, uncertain as to which ought to be poured first, managed to upend both over a tea cup at once. Aunt Fanny grimaced and attempted to distract Lady Garden with discourse of the weather.
“I cannot say I have noticed,” said Lady Garden. Quentin approached with cup and saucer, which she ignored - or did not see, because of her headwear. He placed the tea on a side table and returned to his duties.
“One lump?” he asked Miss Garden, who glared at him. “I mean of sugar,” he clarified.
An unintelligible grunt ensued, baffling him completely. Miss Garden rose and approached the table. She took the cup and saucer he proffered, and the sugar bowl with it and returned to her chair.
“Bread and butter, My Lady?” Aunt Fanny gestured for the plate of rolled slices to be brought over. Quentin began to feel sympathy for Birkworth but quickly quashed it - the fellow is paid for his labours; I am not!
The silence was filled by the delicate grazing of Lady Garden and the unseemly grunting of Miss Garden that brought to mind the idea of a pig at a trough. Aunt Fanny assumed an attitude of ignoring the sounds but Quentin was like a man transfixed, unable to tear his gaze away as Miss Garden devoured the refreshments one plate at a time. The bread and butter was first demolished, and then the cucumber sandwiches and salad leaves. Miss Garden’s audible appreciation increased when it came to the quenelles. Breadcrumbs encircled her tireless mouth.
Aunt Fanny felt compelled to say something in a bid to slow down the girl’s consumption. “You like the fish cakes then, my dear?”
Miss Garden grunted through a mouthful of mash. Quentin did not know whether to laugh or gasp in censure of this woeful and wilful lack of propriety. Miss Garden shoved the platter toward her mother, imploring her to sample something of what was left.
“Yes, please try a quenelle,” said Aunt Fanny. “Our cook is nothing short of adventurous.”
Lady Garden declined with a dip of her head. “Quenelles?” she said. “Sounds a bit French.”
She got to her feet and tilted her head right back in order to look her hostess directly in the eye. “Madam, I have come to your house and you have served me French cuisine.”
“They are merely fish cakes,” said Aunt Fanny. “A rose by any other word...”
Lady Garden bristled. “Is that some slight on my dear daughter?”
“I assure you, it is not. Please, be seated. Have some more tea - English tea. We still have matters of import to discuss.”
“No, Madam, we have not. Rose, rise!”
Miss Garden stood and, wilting beneath her mother’s glare, surrendered the plate to Quentin.
“Good day to you,” Lady Garden nodded to Aunt Fanny. “An alliance between our families is impossible.”
She strode out; Miss Garden lumbered after her, licking her fingertips.
Aunt Fanny looked stricken. Quentin offered to pour more tea.
“Foolish boy! We must dismiss the cook.”
“Dismiss the cook! Not on your life. Besides, it is my father’s place to dismiss the servants, should the need arise.”
Aunt Fanny growled. “What did you do? What did you say to put them off? You must have done something.”
“I, Aunt? I think not. Besides, you cannot seriously have hoped to betroth me to that - that - young lady. She was eminently unsuitable for a life indoors.”
“We have no room to be pernickety.”
“But, Aunt - you cannot wish to pursue this folly.”
“O, you are to be married, my boy; make no bones about that. But on the next occasion I shall vet the menu myself. There will be no repetition of the quenelle debacle.”
“I must say, your French vocabulary is coming along.”
Aunt Fanny roared so alarmingly Quentin recoiled but he continued to revel in the outcome of the morning’s business. He felt as though a great weight had been lifted and an enormous cloud had dispersed, washing him in sunlight.
“One might say,” he chuckled from a safe distance, “that Rose has been plucked from your schemes, Aunt, and where your Lady Garden is concerned, it has been a very close shave.”
Qualified
Quentin rode out of the gates at two o’clock; Francis had not let him down. It was good to be free of the confines of the estate, even though the grounds were larger by far than the entire village of Little Quigley. Satan seemed to read his rider’s mind and cantered directly to the village, coming smartly to a standstill at the doctor’s door.
The office was shut. Confound the man! He is always out and about helping people; it is inconsiderate and selfish when I have need of him!
He turned Satan around and, sensing his master’s mood, the animal slowed its pace; he too was reluctant to return to the close quarters of the stable without having a proper ride out.
They took the path through the wood, stopping at a clearing a little way from the track. Here, Satan was left to browse while Quentin, removing the lacquered box from his coat, attempted to teach himself the game of quoits.
Included in the kit was a length of dowelling, sharpened to a point at one end. This must be the peg at which the hoops are to be tossed. Quentin approached a spot near the centre of the clearing and stooped to push the point into the ground. But, when he straightened up, the stick fell over. After three further attempts resulted in identical failure, he was on the point of giving up and going home when he experienced the unnerving sensation of being observed.
He turned around, squinting at the surrounding foliage for a pair of eyes. A twig snapped. Several woodpigeons fluttered skywards. Quentin gasped; he turned again and was confronted by the large, brown eyes and quivering snout of a deer. He froze. The creature strolled away, chewing blades of grass in graceful nonchalance.
When Quentin had recovered from this vicious animal attack, the idea struck him to strike the spike home with a stone of some kind. He cast about until he espied a suitable candidate. How very primitive, he mused! This is how the earliest men must have carried on - when they were setting up their games of quoits. Civilisation, then, has not moved on at all! He shuddered to think of the ordeal that lay ahead. To mingle with the low fellows and base ruffians! To participate in their lowbrow pastime! The very idea made his flesh creep.
He forced himself to think of his father’s admonishments about the family name, honour, and unbeaten record, but such thoughts only served to lower his mood further.
A whinny from Satan punctuated his thinking. There was nothing for it but to make a good fist of it and do his level best. He stepped away from the peg, which was now firmly erect in the soil, and plucked a quoit from the carrying case. He turned the thing around and around in his hands but there was no indication of which way was up or should face forward or anything helpful at all. So he threw it, overarm, like one of the cricketers to whom he barely paid attention on the village green. The hoop went wide of the target, slapping flatly on the ground. It lay there, gaping up at him as if to say ‘O!’
O, indeed, thought Quentin, moving to retrieve it.
“Well, well,” said a voice, approaching from the rear. Quentin straightened up with a start and jumped around. The impertinent smile of that upstart stable boy greeted him most vilely.
“Be off!” Quentin snapped. “Let me enjoy my privacy.”
Francis chuckled and held up his hands. “I’ve no wish to intrude, sir, only I saw your horse and I thought I’d better check to see if you were all right, if you’d been thrown off. Horses can easily be spooked in these woods, sir.”
“Well, as you can plainly see I am perfectly fine. I repeat my earlier instruction, you tedious fellow: be off!”
Francis did not move. “Very well, sir, but I reckon you could do with my help, sir. With your wrist action, sir.”
Quentin bridled at the suggestion.
“I saw what you was doing, sir - it’s a technique I’ve never come across before. Perhaps it’s the way they do it in France or something.”
Quentin sneered. “They don’t play quoits in France; don’t be absurd. They play at boules and pétanque.”
“And the best of luck to them, but it’s a quoits tournament you have coming upon you and you’ll never score so much as a single point if you carries on the way you’re going.”
Quentin was incensed. “And you would know all about it, I suppose.”
“I profess some measure of expertise in the sport, sir,” Francis grinned. “It was the Squire himself as taught me.”
Quentin gaped but before he could utter a syllable of disdain the impudent stable boy was helping himself to the contents of the lacquered box.
“Nice hoop,” he ran his thumb around the rim.
“Replace that thing at once!”
Instead, Francis took out the remaining three. Almost too quick for Quentin to see, the stable boy flicked his wrist once, twice, thrice and again. Four quoits encircled the peg in a neat little stack.
Quentin’s mouth hung open. Francis winked.
“Show me!”
“Come here then, sir.”
Francis approached the young master from behind, reaching around to take his wrist. He placed a quoit in Quentin’s hand and marched him until he was directly over the peg.
“Now, release.”
Quentin opened his hand. The quoit dropped over the peg.
“A direct hit!” said Francis, his breath hot against Quentin’s neck.
“I am sure that would be disqualified,” said Quentin, more than a little uncomfortable at the stable boy’s proximity. “I am but a novice but doesn’t one have to stand at some distance away from the thingamabob?”
“I wanted to start off with success,” said Francis. “To keep your spirits up.”
“How kind.”
Francis pulled Quentin a step back from the peg and pressed another quoit into his hand. “Try now.”
Quentin released the quoit. It glanced off the peg and dropped to the ground.
“You do have to aim,” said Francis. He gave him another quoit. “Flick the wrist like this.”
He moved the young master’s arm to demonstrate. Quentin learned the motion and tossed the quoit. It slipped over the peg. Quentin gasped in delight and clapped his hands. “Again!”
Francis moved him back another step. This time it took three attempts to succeed. Gradually, they worked their way backwards across the dell, increasing the distance between thrower and peg one step at a time. Quentin, his confidence increased, told the stable boy he might now stand aside, and so Francis watched from a distance, dispensing tips and encouragement in equal measure.
The afternoon slipped away. Tree-shaped shadows extended across the glade but the young men did not notice. Quentin’s success rate was sixty-forty; Francis acclaimed this was not at all bad for a first day and vowed to help him practice every day until the tournament.
“I am sure I can manage alone,” said Quentin.
“I don’t think so, sir. There is something I haven’t told you.”
“And what might that be?”
“These quoits, sir, fine though they be - they won’t be the type used in the competition.”
“What mean you? These are my father’s quoits and he is the reigning county champion.”
“That’s true, sir, but this is a presentation set, sir. The competition uses rings of steel, sir. And they’re heavy, sir. Up to five pounds each.”
“Expensive!”
“That’s the weight, sir.”
“My word!”
“So you need my help, sir. To get your strength up. We can start with the real thing tomorrow, sir. I’ll get down to the village and borrow us some metal quoits. And we can practice with them, sir. And there’s still the scoring system to teach you, and-”
“Enough!” Quentin thrust the quoits at Francis’s chest. He peered into the stable boy’s brown eyes. “Can I do it, do you think? In a week?”
Quoits and Quotability Page 4