“Give that the oneth over, thir.”
Berry took the paper and read the writing aloud.
To Miss Emma Pleydell.
Please allow bearer to take the twelve portraits away.
A Watchet.
Then he handed it back.
“Who’s Watchet?” he said.
“Mr Blurtth reprethentative.”
“What if he does?” said Berry. “That’s his affair.”
Mr Lemonbaum choked. Then he seized the trumpet and hooted into its depths.
“But you’ve got the portraitth,” he howled.
“I shouldn’t,” said Berry. “You’ll only get into trouble. And I didn’t know Mr Watchet had any pictures there.”
“They’re Blurt’th,” screamed Lemonbaum.
“No, you won’t,” said Berry. “I have them specially made.” With that, he inspected his trumpet and, after inserting his fingers into the horn, drew out about two ounces of cotton-wool. “That’s my nephew,” he added. “A playful child.”
Lemonbaum was making a rattling noise…
“There’s the roach-backed warbler,” said Berry. “The first time I’ve heard him this year.”
Encouraged by what he had seen, the dealer plainly decided to try again. He had no idea, of course, that the other end of the trumpet was plugged with wax. He poured his soul into the mouth-piece…
“Thith paper…giveth me the right…to take thothe portraitth away.”
“Then why d’you wear them?” said Berry. “I mean, it’s asking for trouble in weather like this.”
“Right,” screamed the dealer. “Right. I’ve been to Broken Ath, and they thent me here. You thee, Mr Blurt dethireth to have the portraitth in Town.”
“I believe it to be,” said Berry, “though I prefer Aberdeen. But what’s that to do with Mr Watchet?”
Mr Lemonbaum dabbed at the paper. “He’th thigned it for Blurt,” he yelled. “I’m here to take them away.”
“I don’t remember,” said Berry. “I haven’t been there for years.”
“He’th thigned for Blurt,” raved the dealer. “THIGNED FOR BLURT.”
“Is he, indeed?” said Berry. “How very sad. And that, of course, explains why he’s selling. And yet, you know, I’d rather be blind from birth than lose my sight.”
Lemonbaum was half-way to frenzy.
“The pictureth,” he screamed. “The PORTRAITTH. I’VE COME TO TAKE THEM AWAY.”
“I don’t think they will,” said Berry. “You know what Christie’s are.”
The name might have been a charm.
With fallen jaw, the dealer stared upon Berry, as a convict regards a Judge who has given him seven years when he had expected six months.
Twice he endeavoured to speak, and twice he failed.
At the third attempt—
“Chrithtieth?” he wailed. “You mean, you’ve thent them to Chrithtieth?”
“Oh, before then,” said Berry. “They advise the end of November, between you and me. And now I think you should go. If you’re driving straight back to Perth, you’ll get in very late. Besides, I have an appointment. I’ve promised to go to Dovetail to judge some Edinburgh Rocks. Are you interested in poultry?”
But Mr Lemonbaum was not listening. Protruding a thick underlip, he was staring blindly before him and striking his palm with his fist. Suddenly, as though his most bitter reflection was not to be borne, he made a noise like a cat whose tail has been crushed.
“That,” said Berry, “is the copper-bottomed oriole – a very vulgar bird. And no idea of hygiene.”
Looking ready to burst, Mr Lemonbaum picked up his hat, which he had let fall, and turned the way he had come.
Daphne, Berry and I retired to the terrace forthwith.
The baby maze is so slight that it scarcely deserves the name. Still, the dealer was not at his best. When he had been yelling for two minutes, we summoned a gardener and told him to lead him out.
Nearly three weeks had gone by, and August was growing old. Jill and Jonah were with us, and the Bishop, Miss Cobbold and the Baldrics were coming to lunch. About Miss Cobbold’s presence, there had been an argument. But my sister had been insistent.
“I confess she’s Victorian. But that’s no reason why we should ask her alone. The Bishop is Edwardian, and Jonathan and Natalie are Georgian. I don’t know what we are, but that is beside the point. I believe in mixing the periods. It brings the best out of each.”
“The stomacher,” said Berry, “is always right.”
And so Miss Cobbold had been asked to meet the Bishop of Brooch.
The portraits were still at White Ladies, to our relief. Peruke had come down to see them, to our delight: but we had made a point of being abroad for the day. Ten days after his visit, Berry had written to Boris, renewing our offer and asking him to make up his mind. Boris had replied from Norfolk, declaring that he was awaiting Peruke’s report. His letter had reached us that morning – ten minutes ago.
“It’s a lie,” said Daphne. “Of course he’s heard from Peruke.”
“That’s right,” said Berry. “The shy little sweetheart is trying to string us along. Reaching after the shadow, but keeping the substance safe. I’ll lay he’s got our offer locked up in his make-up box.”
“From what you tell me,” said Jonah, “I’m much inclined to agree. That type is avaricious.”
“Oh, don’t talk like that,” minced Berry. “I know you don’t mean it, dear, but, you see, it always unnerves me.” He turned to me. “D’you remember that night at The Cesspool, when I was so unnerved? I felt there were great birds all round me. Oh, it was such a nightmare. But you were so wonderful, darling. You lent me your own spittoon.”
“He can’t,” said Jill, “he can’t be as bad as that.”
“It’s exactly like him,” said I.
“What,” said Berry, “I should really have liked to see was the grocer’s rejection of his advances, when Boris expressed a desire to rent his shop. Never mind. As you say, he’s probably lying. But I don’t see what we can do, until Basing comes back. Then he can get in touch with Peruke.”
Basing was returning from Paris in three days’ time.
Jonah sighed.
“I’m not blaming you,’ he said, “but you should have got tough. That is the only way to reduce that type. Of course the man’s a fool – he won’t get twenty-five thousand anywhere else. But he’s a full-marks’ knave. What’s more to the point, he’s a coward. And if you had shown him the whip, he’d have given in.”
“What whip, know-all?” said Berry.
“Any whip,” said Jonah. “Threatened to bring a gorilla and let it loose in his shop.”
Jill and I began to shake with laughter.
“I see,” said Berry. “And what about the subsequent proceedings?”
“There wouldn’t have been any,” said Jonah. “People like Boris never come into Court. And if they do, they go down. If we want to keep those portraits, we’ll have to do it yet.” He leaned forward. “I’ll tell you why. Because, if we don’t, the other fellow will. And there’ll be the Holbein gone, and Boris crying his eyes out because he forgot the commission of twenty per cent.”
There was a painful silence. Jonah was very shrewd.
At length—
“I do wish,” said Daphne, “our forbears had had less expensive tastes. Why did they have to go to Holbein and van Dyck?”
“My sweet,” said Berry, “dishonour where dishonour is due. They wanted the best for us. It never entered their heads that they were laying up treasure for Mr Boris Blurt. The whole affair is enough to make them turn in their graves.”
“We’ve got to have them,” cried Jill. “The portraits, I mean. You see, if we let them go, they’ll be simply wild. They really will turn in their graves. And we don’t want to break our record…”
We knew what she meant. White Ladies had always been an untroubled house. And Basing maintained that ghosts were unhappy beings, hauntin
g the scene of some trouble they could not cure.
“It’s a proper swine,” said Berry, “and that’s the truth. I could put it much more strongly, but let that go. We’re ready to beggar ourselves, to get those portraits back – not for ourselves, but because they belong to this house. Nine men out of ten would have jumped at twenty-five thousand pounds. Nine men out of ten would have felt that we had a right to buy them for such a sum. But Boris Blurt is the tenth. That treacherous slice of sob-stuff, that grossly ignorant hybrid is going to do us down – and himself as well. He’s damned near done it once. And we had to go out and save him, to save ourselves. And what is our reward – our guerdon? The privilege of housing our pictures, while he does his level best to sell them elsewhere.”
“Hush,” said Daphne. “I think I hear somebody’s car.”
“Now if it’s dear Jonathan,” said Berry, “you’re not to take him away. I want him all to myself. We’re going to read Dante together in the original tongue. I always think Italian’s so piquant. German disturbs me, you know. But—”
“If you go on like that, when anyone’s here…”
“That’s all right,” said Berry. “I’m going to leaven the lunch with a little Lemonbaum.” With a hideous leer, he addressed himself to an elegant pillar of bronze. “Itth tho nithe to thee you, Mith Cobbold, and thank you in perthon for thothe delithious medlarth. They’re wonderful thingth – I wath up all night, you know.”
Before Daphne had time to protest, the door was opened, and the Bishop of Brooch was announced.
Coffee had been served upon the terrace, when the Bishop fingered his chin.
“I’m speaking off the record,” he said, “but my opinion is that, before many years have gone by, this civilization of ours is going to come to an end.”
“I entirely agree,” said Jonah. “But what’s to be done?”
“I sincerely believe that the matter is out of our hands.”
“Are we so wicked?” said Daphne.
The Bishop shook his head.
“There’s room for improvement,” he said, “but then there always was. It’s simply a question of progress. Once we progressed by crawling. And then we walked. Then we began to hasten. And now we rush. Every year the pace grows hotter. And one day something will go. And don’t forget that every year the structure grows more elaborate, and so more vulnerable.”
“I quite agree,” said Berry. “And now for the date of the deluge.”
“No, you don’t,” said his lordship. “I’ve said too much, as it is. Besides, I have no idea. I’m not among the prophets.”
“Well, you eat strange food,” said Berry. “At least, you had that reputation, when we were at Oxford College in ’sixty-four.”
“Make it ’fifty-four,” said the Bishop. “Then we shall be able to remember the Charge of the Light Brigade.”
“What did he eat?” said Natalie.
“His diet,” said Berry, “was completely Biblical.”
“I regret,” said the Bishop, “to have to denounce that report. All I did was to display a discernment denied to and, therefore, misconstrued by my less fortunate colleagues. Where all were gourmands—”
“Cries of ‘Shame’,” said Berry.
“—I was a gourmet. I had a weakness for medlars. I have it still.”
“Oh, have you?” cried Miss Cobbold. “I’ll send you some.”
“Do,” said Berry. “He can’t get locusts here, and I think the Rokesby medlars might take their place.”
“There you are,” declared Miss Cobbold. “I said that to send them to people was an unfriendly act. But Bursley – that’s the butler – was most insistent that they were highly esteemed.”
“When was this?” said the Bishop.
“A month ago.”
His lordship began to laugh.
“You sent him last year’s,” he said. “Very few people can enjoy them as old as that.”
Miss Cobbold had a hand to her mouth.
“How dreadful of me. Major Pleydell, what can I say?”
“That’s all right,” said Berry. “After the first two dozen, I felt there was something wrong. So we caught what were left, took them into the meadows and let them go.”
“I hope,” said the Bishop, “they didn’t devour the grass.”
“On the contrary,” said Berry, “we expect the hay next year to be superfine.”
But Miss Cobbold refused to be comforted.
“You’re very forgiving,” she said, “to have given me lunch.”
“Let me absolve you,” said the Bishop. “And please let me have a basket of this year’s crop.”
“No Popery,” said Berry. “Indulgences aren’t allowed, And how d’you like Rokesby, Miss Cobbold?”
“It suits me very well, thank you. I don’t go abroad very much. The grounds are so lovely, you know. But I’m having trouble with servants. I do the best I can, but they find it dull.”
“Same here,” said Natalie. “How our great-uncle managed, I do not know. We’ve had to close half the house.”
“Progress,” murmured the Bishop.
“Uncertainty,” said Jonah, “has much to answer for.”
“That’s very true. The well-known phrase, ‘the changes and chances of this mortal life’, has come for us all to take on a fearful meaning. Today – we never know. And so all strive to get the most out of our days – which, of course, though natural enough, is a great mistake.” The Bishop turned to Jill. “You don’t strive, my dear.”
“I don’t have to,” said Jill. “It always seems to be there. I’m very fortunate.”
“I think for you it will always seem to be there. But most of us, including our servants, don’t want to get left. I deplore, but I can’t condemn. The standard of life has risen. We’ve tasted blood. We take for granted things that our fathers would have gaped at – paid to see. Some of us are sated, and so are glad to throw back. All of us here, I think, set store by the countryside. I’d sooner stroll in my close than sit in a cinema-house. But young men and maidens wouldn’t. They want to go out and dance – a very natural impulse, which we have known. All the time, the sand is falling… Can you blame them if Rokesby and Buckram don’t suit their book? Jonah’s quite right. Uncertainty’s Progress’ familiar. It marches behind. I don’t think we realized that, until the Great War. And then we saw how very small a matter could throw into utter confusion our way of life.”
Jonathan Baldric was speaking.
“But what can we do about it? I mean, we look to you.”
“Nothing,” said the Bishop. “Not even Wycliffe would cut any ice today. The pace is too hot. We can only do our duty…and hope and pray for the best.”
“Ah,” said Jonathan Baldric, “if everyone did his duty…”
“Precisely. A great many do: but then a great many don’t. There are many Gallios going, who ‘care for none of these things’. The truth is they haven’t time. And so we come back to pace. It’s the pace that kills. But I’ll tell you one thing I observe, and that is a revival of goodwill. People are growing kinder, one to another. And that is worth everything.”
I tried not to think of the portraits – of Vandy, of Boris and Mr Lemonbaum.
“You’re perfectly right,” said Miss Cobbold. “I’ve noticed it, too. For the first time since the war that truly English quality, good nature, seems to be coming back. Don’t you agree, Major Pleydell ?”
Jill’s shoulders were shaking and Daphne had a hand to her mouth.
With a manifest effort—
“Well, I – haven’t been knocked down by it,” said Berry. “But I think I know what you mean. One, er, notices it on the Bench. The police are more reluctant to give a dog a bad name.”
“Oh, come,” said the Bishop. “You of all men should put it higher than that. But, whether or no, Miss Cobbold and I are right. We used to be called Merry England, and I shall always think we deserved the name. We have a sense of humour that nothing can ever quench. The bl
ood and slush of the trenches signally failed. But the war was a very great shock. And great shocks have great reactions. We were much more than sobered – nervy, suspicious, fretful for year after year. There was no health in us. But now we are getting better, and our inherent good nature is coming back into its own.”
“Well, here’s to it,” said Berry, raising his glass. “For home consumption only. And the Empire, of course.”
Miss Cobbold laughed.
“Isn’t that a contradiction in terms?”
But Jonah shook his head.
“In foreign countries, Miss Cobbold, good nature is not understood. It is, therefore, interpreted as weakness. For that I can vouch. Civility – yes, of course. But good nature – no.”
The Bishop was looking at Jonah.
“You think we’re making mistakes?”
“I’m afraid so. Some very bad ones. We still use the velvet glove, but we find the iron hand démodé – not quite nice. And that is a very great pity, for the iron hand is something that foreign nations respect.”
“Progress,” murmured the Bishop. “We’re getting soft.”
“You’re not, sir,” said Jonathan Baldric. “Neither am I. I’ve been reclaimed, you know. I used to breakfast at ten and retire about three. But my wife has altered all that. I was up at five this morning to – to comfort a cow. I rather fancy the byre. But the lambing season’s blank verse. Muckin’ about with a lantern all night long. An’ a wind like a circular saw, an’ the shepherd tight. Mind you, I don’t blame him. But if anyone says I’m soft, they’ve got it wrong.”
‘It’s perfectly true,” said Natalie. “He carries calves about.”
“Only Ahasuerus,” said her husband. “But Ahasuerus has got a crush on me. When I put him under my arm, he licks my face. There’s a lot in this livestock racket.”
“Would you go back?” said Daphne.
“Not on your life, lady. I don’t do the brutes much good, but – they’ve got me down.”
“I give you best,” said the Bishop. “Or should I commend your wife?”
Natalie laughed.
“I may have sown the seed, but the soil was terribly good.”
Berry Scene Page 27