Crampton Hodnet (2 page)

‘You must meet each other,’ said Miss Doggett. ‘Of course Michael and Gabriel are
quite
at home here,’ she added, smiling. ‘They are in their second year. Whom have you brought with you?’ she asked, noticing for the first time another young man, who was still standing in the doorway.

‘Oh, we didn’t
bring
him,’ said Michael. ‘He just happened to be coming in through the gate at the same time. But we gave him some words of cheer. Gabriel quoted Wordsworth to him.’

‘Yes, I quoted Wordsworth,’ said Gabriel, in a satisfied tone.

‘Ah, you must be Mr. Wyatt,’ said Miss Doggett triumphantly. ‘Now we can have tea.’

The five young men were now arranged round the room.

Where but in a North Oxford drawing-room would one find such a curiously ill-assorted company? thought Miss Morrow. The only people who seemed really at ease were Michael and Gabriel, but then they were old Etonians, and Miss Morrow was naive enough to imagine that old Etonians were quite at ease anywhere. They sat giggling at some private joke, while the others made an attempt to start a general conversation.

Mr. Wyatt, a dark, serious-looking young man who was reading Theology, asked if anyone had seen the play at the Playhouse that week.

Nobody had.

‘I hope that doesn’t mean that we shall have nothing to talk about,’ said Miss Morrow gravely.

‘Now, Gabriel, you like Russian tea, don’t you?’ said Miss Doggett.

‘Yes, he thinks he is a character out of Chekhov,’ said Michael. ‘He looks perfectly
lovely
in his Russian shirt. He nearly wore it this afternoon, but we thought it wasn’t
quite
the thing for North Oxford and we can’t
bear
to strike a discordant note, can we, Gabriel?’

‘But isn’t there something Chekhovian about North Oxford?’ said Mr. Wyatt unexpectedly. ‘I always feel that there is.’

‘Yes,’ said Miss Morrow, ‘but I don’t think you feel it when you live here. You lose your sense of perspective when you get too close, and the charm goes.’ She said these last words rather hurriedly, hoping that Miss Doggett had not understood their implication.

But Miss Doggett was talking about shirts. ‘I think it is just as well to dress conventionally,’ she said, ‘otherwise I don’t know where we should be. I suppose Mr. Cherry would be appearing in a
red
shirt.’

‘Oh, really?
Do
tell us why.’ Michael and Gabriel turned to the unfortunate Mr. Cherry, whose face had turned as red as the shirt he might have worn had he not put on his most conventional blue-and-white-striped one.

‘I suppose Miss Doggett means because I’m a Socialist,’ he said, in a muffled voice.

‘
Oh
.’ Michael and Gabriel were obviously disappointed at this dull explanation. They were not interested in politics.

‘You have nothing to eat, Mr. Cherry,’ said Miss Morrow, passing him two plates.

He hastily took a chocolate biscuit and then regretted it. When your hands were hot with nervousness, the chocolate came off every time you picked up the biscuit to take a bite.

He ought to have thought of that before, but he had been so grateful to Miss Morrow for offering him something that he had eagerly seized the nearest thing. So often at tea parties you had to wait ages before anyone noticed your empty plate, and when your tea had been finished in nervous little sips there was nothing to do but hope and gaze bravely into space.

Mr. Cherry surreptitiously wiped his chocolaty fingers on his clean white handkerchief. He wasn’t really at ease with people like this, he told himself defensively. He couldn’t be expected to have much in common with this old woman and her companion, those two giggling pansies on the sofa, that hearty Bompas or even with Wyatt, the theological student. He wouldn’t come here again. Next time he would have a previous engagement.

‘Now, Michael, what are you laughing at?’ asked Miss Doggett indulgently.

‘He wants to see the engravings of the Bavarian lakes,’ said Gabriel, ‘but he’s too shy to ask.’

‘I shall be glad to show them to you,’ said Miss Doggett. She turned to the others. ‘Michael and Gabriel are really interested in
Art
,’ she said impressively. ‘One so seldom finds that nowadays. I don’t mean that hideous stuff
you
call Art,’ she said suddenly to Mr. Bompas. ‘Not those pictures that might just as well hang upside down.’

Mr. Bompas, whose pictures, being school groups and photographs of actresses, were of the sort that must of necessity hang right way up, had nothing to say to this.

Miss Doggett sat down between Michael and Gabriel and opened the portfolio of engravings.

The others began some sort of a conversation with Miss Morrow, but it was a poor thing which soon flagged, and eventually the three of them stood up to go.

‘But you can’t go yet,’ said Miss Doggett. ‘I’ve hardly spoken to you.’

‘I’m afraid I really must,’ said Mr. Wyatt. ‘We have chapel at six.’

‘And Mr. Cherry and Mr. Bompas, you have chapel too?’

For one fatal second they hesitated and were lost.

‘I want to talk to you about your aunt,’ said Miss Doggett to Mr. Bompas. ‘And, Mr. Cherry, I think you need some advice from an older person.’

Michael let out a snort of laughter and received a sharp kick on the ankle from Gabriel’s elegant suede shoe.

Miss Doggett cleared her throat and said impressively, ‘I always think it such a pity when I see young people up here wasting their time in doing something which can only bring disgrace upon their families. All this Socialism and Bolshevism, for instance. If you take my advice, Mr. Cherry, you’ll have nothing to do with it.’

‘I don’t see how it can bring disgrace on my family/ said Mr. Cherry, with sudden boldness.

‘Do you think your mother would like to see you speaking in Hyde Park?’ demanded Miss Doggett.

‘My mother is dead,’ said Mr. Cherry, feeling that he had scored a point. ‘I was brought up by an aunt.’ He smiled. He rather liked the idea of himself speaking in Hyde Park.

‘Oh, I see.’ Either a natural pity for a motherless boy, or a feeling that bringing disgrace on an aunt was not quite the same thing, stopped Miss Doggett from pursuing the subject any further. ‘Join the Conservative Club, if you like,’ she said, in a more kindly tone, ‘or even the Liberal Club. I am by no means one of those narrow-minded people who condemn all forms of political activity.’

‘Oh, Miss Doggett, is it
really
so late?’ said Michael and Gabriel suddenly. ‘How terrible of us to have stayed so long! We were so
engrossed
in dear Lord Tennyson’s signature.’

‘Yes, it must be nearly half past six,’ said Miss Doggett, glancing at the marble clock on the mantelpiece. ‘I’m afraid I must send you away now. We are going out to supper at my nephew’s house.’ The Clevelands would not be having supper before half past seven at the earliest, but Miss Doggett always liked to be there a good three quarters of an hour before that time, so that she could catch the last of the Sunday afternoon guests. It was sometimes interesting to see who stayed longest.

Mr. Cherry and Mr. Bompas stood up eagerly. Then, to his horror, Mr. Bompas heard a crack and felt something scrunch under his foot. It was the little cactus he had told Mr. Cherry to be careful about. With elaborate concentration he moved the crushed mass of flower-pot, earth and plant with his foot, until it was hidden behind a footstool embroidered with pansies. The others were so much absorbed in their leave-taking that they did not notice his rather curious movements, as if he were practising dribbling a football.

‘I’m afraid we’ve monopolised you,’ said Michael and Gabriel. ‘We’ll be
really
unselfish and not come to tea again till next term.’

‘Oh, Mr. Bompas, I meant to have a long talk with you about your aunt,’ said Miss Doggett. ‘You must come again.’

And so, with many protests and mumbled speeches of thanks from Mr. Cherry and Mr. Bompas, who seemed to be having a race to see who could get out of the room first, the party broke up.

Miss Doggett followed them out into the hall, but Miss Morrow stayed to put the chairs back into their proper places. First of all she removed the crushed cactus from behind the footstool. It could easily be repotted. She was full of admiration for the skill which Mr. Bompas had shown in dealing with the situation. She hadn’t believed him capable of it. Perhaps the future held something more for
him
than sitting in a room somewhere in Luxembourg, putting on gramophone records. She really believed that he might go farther than that, and the discovery made her glad and filled her with hope even for herself, so that she walked upstairs humming one of the tunes she had heard earlier in the afternoon.

At the exact moment when Miss Doggett was walking up the drive to her nephew’s house, Anthea Cleveland, his daughter, was being kissed in the library. The light was on and the curtains were not drawn. And so Miss Doggett was able to see Anthea in the arms of Simon Beddoes, who was telling her that although he had not known of her existence before he entered the Clevelands’ drawing-room that afternoon, he had fallen desperately in love with her.

He had stayed on talking after the other guests had gone and, pretending an interest in some of her father’s seventeenth-century first editions, had contrived that Anthea should show him the library.

Anthea had often been kissed by undergraduates before; indeed, she was the chief reason why the sort of young men who generally avoided North Oxford tea parties would condescend to accept an invitation from the Clevelands. She was a tall, slender girl, with golden hair curling onto her shoulders and a gentle, pretty face, not too intelligent but just right for one whose only occupation in life so far had been to fall in love and be fallen in love with. She was wearing a rather sophisticated peasant dress of blue wool, embroidered with little flowers. Simon liked that. He often went to Kitzbühel for the winter sports.

‘Now you’re angry with me,’ he said in a pleading voice. They usually were at first. ‘Please don’t be angry,’ he said again, with attractive shyness.

He was dark and thin, just a little taller than she was. He had a young, lively face and charming manners. Was it necessary to go through the tedious comedy of being angry? Anthea supposed that she ought to show some kind of disapproval, because it was the first time they had met, and they were standing in a lighted, uncurtained window where anyone might see them. Perhaps, after all, she ought to explain this to him. At least she ought to try. ‘Simon,’ she began, ‘I’m not
angry
… .’

‘You’re not angry!
Darling
Anthea.’ He kissed her again with even greater confidence. ‘You’re so sweet.’

‘I don’t want to be ungracious,’ said Anthea at last, ‘but we’ve got people coming to supper, and I must help to get things ready.’ She gently pushed him out into the hall.

‘But when can I see you again?’ he asked urgently. ‘I
must
see you tomorrow. I’ll call in the morning. Good-bye, darling. I shall think of you every moment till tomorrow,’ he called, as he went out of the front door.

It is to be hoped that he has no essay to write, thought Miss Doggett drily, as she came into the hall from the cloak-room, where she had been taking off her coat. She found Anthea gazing thoughtfully at a vase of dahlias which stood on the oak chest.

‘Doing the flowers, Anthea?’ she said brightly. It was time she found a suitable husband, she thought. It was bad for her to be hanging round Oxford with men too young for her.

‘Oh, do go into the drawing-room, Aunt Maude,’ said Anthea. ‘Father and Mother are there. Haven’t you brought Miss Morrow with you?’

‘She is coming later. I believe the vicar and his wife are expected, aren’t they? They will be able to tell us about the new curate.’

‘Yes, I expect they’ll be late. Mrs. Wardell is so hopelessly unpunctual.’ Anthea shepherded her great-aunt into the drawing-room, where the rest of the family were eating up the remains of tea.

Francis Cleveland stood with his back to the fireplace, holding a slice of fruit-cake in his hand. The crumbs dropped onto the carpet as he waved his hand about to illustrate what he was saying. He was a tall, distinguished-looking man in the early fifties, with a thin, sensitive face and dark hair streaked with grey. Young women flocked to his lectures on the seventeenth century. It was a delight for them to hear him read Donne in his rather affected voice, or to smile—not laugh—at his subtle jokes, exactly the same jokes, had they but known it, that had delighted generations of admiring young women. Francis Cleveland was a fortunate man with a comfortable, easy occupation, some private means and nothing to do but give the same lectures and tutorials he had given for the past twenty-five years. When he had any leisure he worked at his book. This was a study of his ancestor, John Cleveland, the poet. He had started it twenty-eight years ago as a thesis for a post-graduate degree. It was not yet finished, and there seemed no prospect that it ever would be.

Margaret Cleveland, who had at one time helped and encouraged her husband with his work, had now left him to do it alone, because she feared that with her help it might quite easily be finished before one of them died, and then where would they be? Francis was like a restless, difficult child if he had nothing to occupy him. This book meant that he spent long hours in his study, presumably working on it. It would not be at all convenient for Mrs. Cleveland to have him hanging about the drawing-room, wanting to be amused. After nearly thirty years of married life she had come to take very much for granted the handsome, distinguished husband whom she had once loved so passionately. Indeed, she even thought poor Francis rather a bore sometimes. She was two years older than he was, a sensible, kindly woman, stout and grey-haired, with many interests in her life, although vastly different ones from those of her youth. For now she never thought of seventeenth-century love lyrics but only of her house and daughter and the generations of undergraduates, who sometimes needed her help as a friend or even as a mother.