Deck With Flowers

by Elizabeth Cadell

The meal over, he explained that he had already done his share of work.

  “While I’m here,” Nicola told him, “I’d rather you stayed out of the kitchen.”

  “Good. Don’t hurry away.”

  Left with Angela, Nicola referred to the visit she and Rodney had paid to Victoria Lodge.

  “We saw your uncle,” she said.

  “You don’t mean he actually let you in?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he show you the railway that Rodney says is so marvellous?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t remember ever seeing him. Ever since the big row, he’s kept away. Rodney saw him when he was living down in Brighton, and liked him. When Rodney likes anyone, it sticks.”

  “I’ve noticed. Oliver Tallent, for instance.”

  “Well, Oliver’s a lifelong friend. We’ve all known each other all our lives.”

  “Was he always the big bore he is now?”

  “Oliver—a bore?” The tone made Nicola turn from the sink to give her a glance. “Don’t you like him?”

  “If you do, I’ll get myself fitted for glasses, to see what I’ve missed.”

  “He’s awfully nice, really he is.”

  “So your brother keeps saying.” Nicola turned and began to help with the drying. “How often does he drop in?”

  “Here? Oh, never.”

  “Old family friend?”

  “Well, he’s got his own circle of friends. I didn’t see much of him at home after I was grown up, but since I came to live with Rodney, hardly at all. You can imagine what he thinks of this house, after his own.” She hesitated. “I used to mind,” she ended, “but I don’t any more.”

  “Doesn’t he ever come to see Rodney?”

  “Not here. They meet in clubs and pubs, and sometimes they team up and go out to dinner, but Rodney won’t invite him here, I mean he won’t give him a special invitation or press him to come—he’d rather die than let Oliver think ...”

  “That’s brothers. I used to think I’d like one—the girls at school who had brothers were always so popular. But what use are they, when you come to look at it? As now.”

  “It doesn’t matter much. I’m over it.”

  “You are ?”

  “Well, I still think Oliver’s nicer than any other man I’ve ever met, either at home or here in London. Not that there were all that many at home, because my father was always around. He’s one of those parents who’ve never caught up.”

  “Caught up with what?”

  “Oh, you know—men with long curly hair, hippies, hookahs, pop, pot, non-stop sex—in other words, life. The first time a man came to see me wearing a lace blouse and strings of beads, my father grabbed a gun and went out to shoot something—anything—to stop himself from shooting at the beads. Was your father like that?”

  “From my mother’s accounts, anything but. He died when I was five, so I can’t judge, but in his photographs he looks pretty mild—benign. Are you looking forward to this job?”

  “In a way. It’s easy, that’s one thing. I’m not bright. I couldn’t even learn my way round the keys of a typewriter, and I can’t spell, so that only leaves serving in bars and coffee bars, which I’d be no good at, or doing an office-boy sort of job. When I think what it cost to educate me, and what I’m good for, I feel I could have spent the money better myself.” She ushered Nicola into the living room. “Shall we turn on some music?”

  “Yes.”

  “You do it while I wash my hair.”

  Nicola decided to unpack first. When she went back to the living room, Rodney, outstretched on the sofa, was reading a manuscript.

  “Noise bother you?” she asked, and getting no reply, started the music. In a few moments he looked up with a frown.

  “You can keep that thing on, but turn it down,” he ordered.

  “Certainly, Mr. Laird, sir.”

  A yell came from the bathroom.

  “Can’t hear.”

  Nicola adjusted the sound, chose a book from the shelf and sat on the floor to read. After a time, Rodney closed the manuscript dropped it beside the sofa, yawned and lay with his arms behind his head.

  “Bed soon, for me,” he decided. “Got everything you want?”

  “Yes, thank you. Good night.”

  He did not move.

  “You’re our first guest,” he informed her. “My parents prefer hotels. Incidentally, Mrs. Major’s been re-engaged to come up and clean every day. That’s what she used to do before Angela came, but Angela cut down the days to save money. Now she’s planning to pay it out of her earnings.”

  “Then I hope you’ll give the money back and pay it yourself; she isn’t going to earn much. From what I’ve seen of Mrs. Major, a few hours of her cleaning won’t make much difference.”

  “She’s a good worker. All the newcomers up and down the street would give their ears and whiskers to get her. Why did you tell her all those lies?”

  “I told you. When people get over-curious, I start inventing.”

  “Try and teach Angela the technique; the only item Mrs. Major hasn’t elicited about our family history is how much we weighed when we were born.” He gave another pawn. “I’ve eaten too much. I’m not used to good cooking, if and when Angela gets a husband, he’ll have digestive troubles.”

  “Then I hope she gets your friend Oliver.”

  His eyebrows went up.

  “My God, women!” he said wonderingly. “Ten minutes together over the washing-up, and they open their hearts. She actually told you about him?”

  “I gathered she was hankering. If he’s an old family friend, why couldn’t he have been friendly?”

  “Why should he? He saw her grow up. Maybe that accounts for his lack of interest.”

  “When she came up to London, didn’t he even ask her out?”

  “No. At least, he asked us both out to dinner, and turned up with his current girl friend. I suppose you could call that making his position clear.”

  “Why couldn’t you have done something?”

  “Me? What, for instance? Throw her at him?”

  “There are ways.”

  “Such as?”

  “You could have given parties, and asked him here.”

  “Here? It was probably seeing this place that made him keep away. It’s been tidied up for you—we wanted to make a good impression, knowing your Swiss background. When Oliver saw it, it must have photographed itself on his mind. Why not forget Oliver and try to switch Angela to some of the other men who come after her? You don’t like him, anyway.”

  “She does. He seems to be the man she wants—she’s had long enough to find out. I’m all in favour of people marrying when they’ve known each other practically all their lives— there aren’t so many nasty surprises.”

  “I brought the mare to the trough,” he pointed out. “If all she’s done is whinny after the one horse she can’t hope to get, is it my fault?”

  “Yes. And you’ve got it all wrong. She’s the trough. Your job is to lead the horse to it.”

  “The horse we’re discussing isn’t thirsty. I’d be interested to know whether you—”

  He broke off. Angela, in a dressing-gown, her head in a towel turban, had come into the room.

  “You two sound as though you’re having a row,” she commented. “What about?”

  “Horses,” Rodney said. “Which of you two female slaves will make me a nice, hot cup of cocoa?”

  Chapter 5

  Angela’s job began on Monday, and ended on the following Friday, when her employer gave her two weeks’ salary, a lift home and a promise to give her a reference, provided he had to put nothing down on paper. Then he left, remarking somewhat ambiguously that anybody could make mistakes.

  Her mistake, she told Nicola and Rodney that evening, had been in failing to realise that there was more than one Washington.

  “These two passengers, absolutely unconnected with each other, were both going to Washington,” she exp
lained. “An American came in to collect his tickets, and I naturally assumed he was going to the Washington—Washington D.C., if you know what D.C. means. I don’t. So I put this man’s tickets into a Washington D.C. envelope and gave them to him, and he went. Then this other American turned up to collect his tickets, and he was the one who was going to Washington D.C. but the other man had gone off with his tickets instead of the tickets for some quite different Washington, so there was a terrible row. How could I know about the other Washingtons?”

  “Everybody knows,” said Rodney. “Everybody except you. There’s one in Georgia, one in Indiana, one in Kansas, one in Ohio and—”

  “If you’re collecting them,” Nicola said, “there’s one in New Zealand, not to mention one in England.”

  “That all came out when the row was going on,” Angela told them. “They even wrote it down for me—Washington Pa and Washington La; imagine! Why couldn’t they label them East and West and Upper and Lower? So now I haven’t got a job, unless I take Jeffry Hodges up on that offer he made me once.”

  “What offer?” Rodney asked.

  “His aunt runs a boutique in Pont Street. He said he’d always put in a word for me, if I asked him—she’s got a foul temper, and can’t keep girls for long. I wouldn’t mind how foul her temper was, if the money was good. Now that I’ve got used to working, I’d like to go on. I was taken out to lunch three times this week, a terrific saving.”

  “Two week’s pay for one week’s work isn’t a bad start to a career, if you’ve decided to have one,” Rodney observed. “See if you can do as well at the boutique.”

  He was aware that Nicola was less satisfied with the week’s progress. He had been careful to ask no questions; if she had anything to tell him, he would hear it in time. But whatever she had done during the day, her evenings had not been wasted. Released early from Park Lane, and getting home first, she had brought about a noticeable change in the rooms. Mrs. Major left the floors swept and the kitchen scrubbed, but it was Nicola who had made the curtains hang straight, who had strengthened sagging shelves and cleaned rugs and carpets, bringing to light designs which had been hidden for years. She worked without fuss. On the nights on which she did not go out, she cooked, washed clothes, ironed or sat contentedly on the floor, mending. Even Rodney’s pyjamas had been made whole.

  Her manner with the men who had come, on two evenings, to take her out, had been casual; she had been ready to leave, she had offered each of them a drink from her own supply, and had gone, returning early or late but making no disturbance on her return. One man was a doctor, the other a teacher at a boys’ school at Brighton; that, and their names, was all Rodney had been told about them, but his eyes had informed him that they were in love, and he felt sorry for them because as far as he could judge, she didn’t care whether they took her out, or went out without her.

  She had on first coming raised the matter of paying for her room and board. Rodney had told her that this could wait until they knew what way the cat—Madame Landini—was going to jump. She had not argued, but every evening thereafter, there appeared on the table two bottles of wine—red and white.

  On Friday evening, while Angela was engaged in her week-end hair-washing session, she made her first reference to Madame.

  “Nothing, so far,” she said.

  Rodney, finishing a letter to his parents, raised his head. “No mention of memoirs?” he asked.

  “No. This’ll depress you and I hate to say it, but I’ve got a feeling that something’s snapped. I’ve been trying to figure out why, but the only conclusion I can come to is that she’s like a lot of other people who start off with a rush—the thing wears thin, wears itself out, and they lose interest and pack up. For good.”

  “Then why did she ask you to come back?”

  “I wish I knew. Once or twice I’ve thought it was simply to make up for that display of temper or temperament—to erase from my mind, as it were. She may have felt it was bad publicity to have an ex-secretary going round telling people that she looks like with her teeth bared.”

  “Why are you so sure she won’t go on?”

  “I’ve told you. She seems to have forgotten her memoirs, if that isn’t a contradiction in terms. She doesn’t show any interest in her own past any more—only in mine; it’s her way, I suppose, of being gracious. It’s flattering, but it irritates me. I’d rather have her the way she was, outburst and all. I’m sick of being asked to join her at lunch or tea, or coffee in the middle of the morning. And I’m tired of answering her questions.”

  “What does she want to know?”

  “Nothing. It’s just a general attempt to be friendly, but she’s acting out of character; you can tell by the way Signor Piozzi looks at her every now and then, as if he hadn’t suspected she had any maternal feelings. As I told you, I don’t like personal questions unless people have a right to ask them.”

  “Have you fallen back on inventing?”

  “Yes. Go on with your letter. I’m sorry I interrupted.”

  “Is the Maharajah still around?”

  “He comes and goes. The palazzo deal’s through. He now owns a mansion in Geneva, a palazzo in Venice, a villa in Antibes and a shooting lodge on several thousand acres of Scottish moor. All fully staffed. How poor old Signor Piozzi keeps track, I don’t know.” She made a restless movement. “I suppose I ought to be enjoying it. There’s a lot to see, there’s even a lot to learn. There are people in and out all the time, most of them weighed down with fame or money or titles, and some of them worth watching—but if she isn’t going to work, I want to get out. I’ve got nothing to do but answer invitations and type lists of figures for Signor Piozzi. I’m not carping; I like the money. I don’t suppose I’ll ever be paid so much again, but I liked her better before she became friendly. I like my bosses to keep their distance. You said I wasn’t to do any prodding, but if I don’t, how will I ever get her back to her memoirs?”

  “It would be fatal to try and push her. She’s got to decide for herself.”

  “I can decide for myself, too. I’ll give her two more weeks; after that, I’m through.”

  The telephone rang and he got up and went to answer, passing Angela as she came out of her room. There was nothing to be gleaned from his conversation; he said ‘Yes’ several times, and then rang off.

  “Who?” she asked.

  “Oliver.”

  “Oh. Work?”

  “No. He wants me to make a fourth at dinner next week.”

  She made no comment until she was with Nicola in the kitchen after they had finished dinner.

  “That’s the first time he’s ever done that,” she said dejectedly.

  “Who’s done what?”

  “Oliver. He rang up here to fix a party. Before, he’s always had the decency to ring Rodney at the office. Don’t think I mind not being asked—it isn’t that.”

  “I wish you’d put him out of your mind, and go out with those other men who keep ringing up.”

  “I do go sometimes—you know I do. But it doesn’t work. When I go out to dinner and look across the table, I have to take off the head of the man sitting opposite, and put Oliver’s on instead; that’s the only way I can manage to look interested.”

  Nicola pulled down a cloth from a hook and turned to look at her.

  “What on earth made you fall in love with him in the first place?” she asked.

  “Well, have you ever seen anybody better-looking?”

  “Yes.”

  “Or better-dressed?”

  “Good-looking, and dressy. What else?”

  “Nice manners; not off-hand, like so many of them. But it’s no use. This Henrietta’s really got him hooked. Someone told me that she and Oliver gave a party at his house the other night, and when he came home from the office, she discovered he’d forgotten to order flowers, and she made him go straight out again and buy some. I didn’t think he’d ever take orders from anybody, least of all from her. You have to admit she’s c
lever; everybody says so. And I can’t even hold down a job.”

  Angela now went to work in the middle of the week as saleswoman at the Pont Street boutique. Her nightly bulletins to Rodney and Nicola stated that far from finding the proprietress bad-tempered, she found her very easy to get on with—so that her surprise was the greater when on Friday evening she was handed two weeks’ salary and requested not to return.

  “But you must have done something to upset her!” Rodney expostulated.

  “I can’t think of a single thing I did or said that could have annoyed her. She probably had someone else coming, and wanted to get rid of me. She can’t have minded my telling customers when I thought a dress didn’t suit them. If a woman with a behind like the stern of a battleship tries on something fringed that makes her look like a Madam in a Wild West movie, it’s only kindness to tell her so, isn’t it?”

  “Four weeks’ pay for a week and a half’s work,” Rodney summed up. “Where do you think of going next?”

  “How do I know? I suppose I’ll find something.”

  “Why don’t you go to the agency I came from?” Nicola suggested. “They’re good; they’ll find you something.”

  Following this advice, Angela called at the agency on Monday, and in the evening produced a long list of vacant situations.

  “Who told me there was an unemployment crisis?” Rodney asked in wonder.

  “Nobody’d take any of these jobs if they really had to earn a living,” Angela told him. “They’re all down at lift-boy level, where I belong. Those aren’t salaries; they’re tips. If I weren’t being boarded and lodged by you for free, how do you imagine I’d even be able to eat?”

  She went through the list with Nicola after dinner. Rodney, on the sofa, finished a manuscript, dropped it on to the floor beside him and lay listening idly to the names of firms varying from lawyers’ offices to linen-drapers. Soon he was asleep. When he awakened, the choice had been made. On the following Monday, Angela was sent for an interview to a firm in Knightsbridge, engaged and told to report for duty on the following day. She got home late from the interview and went hurrying to her room to change.