Mrs. Tim of the Regiment (18 page)

‘Mrs. Christie,' she says, coming to the gate rake in hand, ‘pardon an old woman for being inquisitive, but I've been wondering all the morning if there's anything wrong. Yon telegraph – laddies always give me the shudders I've not been able to stand the sight of them since the war, and there have been three on your doorstep already and gracious me, here's another!' she exclaims, as a red bicycle comes flying up the road to stop at Loanhead gate.

The whole thing is so ridiculous that I start to laugh weakly, and find to my horror that I can't stop. I am seized by the arm in a firm grip, and dragged into the dining room at Holmgarth, where I am planted in a chair with a glass of cherry brandy before me.

‘Drink it up like a good lassie,' says Mrs. Loudon, patting my shoulder as if I were a child. ‘There now, you're feeling better, but don't tell me a word about it unless you want.'

Of course, I tell her the whole thing – it is such a relief to get it off my chest, and Mrs. Loudon is a good listener.

‘Well, well!' she says comfortingly, ‘We were all young once – and when the baby's safely here she'll have no time for such like cantrips. Well, well! And me thinking there had been a death in the family at least!'

Third April

Holiday today which means that I have not got to see Cook. I rise joyfully and bathe with song. Tim says I seem in good fettle this morning. Curious how seldom Tim and I are in good fettle at the same moment. Tim says we ought to go to the parish church, which is Presbyterian, of course, and repeats his favourite maxim about doing what the Romans do. Grace is in bed for breakfast, but says she will get up and come too, as she is anxious to see what it is like. I point out that we have no books, but Tim says they don't have prayer books, but just make it up as they go along Grace says she thinks it is very clever of them.

We impress Grace with the necessity of taking her umbrella (although the sky is cloudless), and join the throng of fashionably attired churchgoers, all of whom seem to be making their way to the Parish Church. I reflect that neither of my companions is attending church with orthodox motives, but perhaps it is better to attend with unorthodox motives than not at all.

The verger (or whatever he is called) informs us in a loud voice that the ‘place is thrang today because Mister McPhoy is retiring', but finds us three seats in the gallery, from which we can look down upon the Sunday hats of the assembled multitude.

Am surprised at the amount of talking that goes on before the service starts, also at the odour of peppermint and cinnamon that emanates from the congregation, but what astonishes me most is the fact that nobody makes any attempt to kneel down during the prayers. Grace has noticed this peculiarity also, and mentions it to Tim on the way home. He replies that these people are descendants of the Covenanters, who held services on the hillside where it was often too damp to kneel down, and the custom has survived.

After lunch Grace and I break the Sabbath by painting a seat in a secluded corner of the garden. We have nearly finished the job when Annie approaches and says breathlessly that she has been looking everywhere for us as Colonel and Mrs. Walker have called. I realise that this is the colonel of Tim's territorial battalion and his wife upon whom Tim wished me to make a good impression. Grace offers to entertain the Walkers while I remove the ravages of the green paint from my person. She points out that it is not so important for
her
to make a good impression, which of course is true. I advise her, however, to remove green paint from her nose before entering the drawing room. Grace says – Why? The Walkers will merely think a green nose is the latest fashion from London. Have no time to argue with Grace – seize the turpentine bottle and fly upstairs to the bathroom.

When I am at last in a presentable condition, I go into the drawing room and find that Grace's nose is the usual colour – or perhaps slightly more pink – and am glad to think she has taken my advice. Colonel Walker seems quite pleased with my deputy, but Mrs. Walker looks slightly peevish. I confine my attentions to the latter, and talk feverishly about the first thing that comes into my head, which happens to be Epstein's method of sculpture – an article upon the subject having appeared in the morning's papers. The choice is unfortunate, as Mrs. Walker never reads the Sunday papers, and has a confused idea that the sculptor and the inventor of relativity are one and the same man. Feel that the best thing to do is to drop the subject.

At this moment a diversion is created by Betty, who appears at the door with a crimson face and says that the Man Who Lives Next Door has stolen her ball the new one that I got her at Woolworth's. Suggest that she should say ‘How do you do?' in the approved manner before explaining herself further. Betty shakes hands rapidly with the visitors and says that she was playing with her ball in the garden, and it went over the fence, and the Man Who Lives Next Door said he wouldn't give it to her because it was Sunday, and will I come at once and tell him he is to. The situation is delicate as I have no idea whether the Walkers share the views of the Man Who Lives Next Door as to the wickedness of playing ball on Sunday, or whether their observance of the Sabbath merely consists of banning newspapers printed on this day of rest. I hedge feebly by suggesting that she should find some more fitting occupation for Sunday afternoon and assure her that she will get her ball tomorrow. ‘But you never said I wasn't to play with it,' she points out, ‘and I've got to go to school tomorrow. Annie says the man is a thief to keep my ball, and I think so too.'

Mrs. Walker's face remains sphinx-like during this exhibition of parental weakness, and I feel sure that any impression she may be receiving is not so good as Tim would wish. Fortunately Betty realises that I will do nothing about her ball, and goes away without any further remarks upon the subject. Soon after, the Walkers depart in a large Armstrong-Siddeley, and Grace and I relapse into chairs thoroughly exhausted by our efforts to be entertaining.

‘Hester,' says Grace suddenly, ‘Don't you think Hamish is a nice name? Hamish McDougall sounds well; please remember to tell Jack that I wanted the baby called Hamish.'

I suggest mildly that the information would come better from Grace herself, whereupon she replies that she will not be here – she is quite sure she will die – and will I remember her words when she is gone and be the baby's godmother and help poor Jack to bring it up. ‘And oh Hester!' she continues, ‘how lovely it will be when Hamish is grown up and we can go about together I do hope he will be fair like Jack and awfully good at cricket, and we shall go to Lord's and see him play for Eton I think I shall be sick with fright when he goes in to bat.'

Feel it would be tactless to point out that if Grace is dead she won't be able to go to Lord's (or at any rate will not be sick, not having – – – a body) so I merely reply that it is sure to be an anxious moment for her when Hamish goes in to bat, and that I hope his godmother will be asked to join the party on that auspicious occasion.

Jack arrives by the late train. I take him up to Grace's room and shut the door upon their transports of affection and delight at their reunion.

Tim says he is going to bed, and does so. I remain in the dining room to feed the traveller when his ardour shall have abated sufficiently to allow him to partake of sustenance. After about an hour Jack appears with a dazed but rapturous expression, and says Grace is simply wonderful. She has forgiven him and everything is all right. He thinks it shows a most wonderful character to be able to forgive like that – Grace's character is wonderful. I can have no conception – not having lived with Grace – what a wonderful girl she is. So brave, and good, and altogether wonderful. By this time I am so sleepy I can hardly keep my eyes open. Fortunately Jack is too intent on extolling his wife to notice my smothered yawns. It is one o'clock before I manage to get rid of the man and crawl into bed more dead than alive.

My last thought is one of inhospitable thankfulness that our guests are going away tomorrow.

Fourth April

Our guests announce their intention of going south by the midday train, and of spending tomorrow in London, as Jack wants to buy a hat for Grace. Try to remember whether Tim ever felt he wanted to buy anything for me in London, but cannot recollect any occasion of the sort. Grace breakfasts in bed, waited on hand and foot by her adoring mate.

After Tim has departed Jack attaches himself to me. He is still full of admiration for his wife, and the only way I can shake him off is by visiting the kitchen, whereupon Jack takes the local paper and vanishes into the garden with it. I find him half an hour later reclining upon the garden seat Grace and I painted yesterday. The paint is not yet dry upon the seat, and Jack has the greatest difficulty in tearing himself from its hospitable embrace. ‘Good Heavens, Hester!' he says, trying to look at his back and failing in the attempt, ‘how was I to know? Why didn't you put Wet Paint on the beastly thing?' Reply hysterically that I did put wet paint on the beastly thing – Grace and I spent most of Sunday afternoon putting wet paint on the beastly thing.

Jack is too annoyed about his new summer suiting to see the joke. We retire to the bathroom, and Jack removes his trousers (the only ones he has brought with him), while I do my best to clean them with turpentine. The paint comes off remarkably well, but the smell of the turpentine remains. Grace says it is horrible, and requests Jack to sit as far away from her as possible; upon which Jack says she is very unreasonable, and that it is not his fault, and that he does not know what people in the train will think, and Grace replies that anybody with any sense would have seen that the paint was wet.

Fortunately the arrival of the taxi puts a stop to this unprofitable discussion. Grace hugs me and says, ‘Hester, you really are – a brick don't forget about Hamish and being his godmother, will you?' And our guests depart in an odour of turpentine.

Tim and I go out and try to obliterate the outline of Jack's form from the garden seat, which we find is difficult if not impossible. Tim says it is a tiring thing having visitors in the house unless, of course, your establishment is run on the lines of Charters Towers, in which case you need not see more of them than you want, and he wonders if it is true about Morley sending in his papers.

Fifth April

Am late for breakfast owing to lassitude engendered by the emotional crisis which has taken place in our house. Find Tim in an irritable mood he has opened by mistake an account of mine from Madame Harcourt at Biddington for a New Evening Dress, which I got at her sale before leaving Biddington on the strength of the myriads of dinners and balls predicted for me at Westburgh by Nora Watt. I have not had the moral courage to confess this extravagance to Tim, and my cowardliness has found me out. Tim says what on earth do I want a new dress for, when my cupboard upstairs is full of perfectly good ones? Couldn't I have got an old one done up if I really need it? Explain hastily that it was a sale and I got the dress very cheap. Tim says there is probably a crab in it somewhere if it
was
cheap. He becomes exceedingly gloomy about financial affairs in general. There are rumours of a drop in pay which is said to be due to the decrease in cost of living. Have not noticed the latter myself, and say so with some force. Tim has not noticed it either. He waxes eloquent on the subject of tariffs.

Tim then opens another letter and finds that it is from Mrs. Strutts, the proprietor of Rokesby, containing a demand for the sum of £6. 4s. 21/2 d. for damages and breakages during our tenancy. (Feel that this has arrived at an unfortunate moment.) Tim says what on earth does this mean, he thought I had replaced all the breakages. Reply that I did so to the best of my ability, and that this must be for damages. Tim says ‘Damages be blowed!' If Mrs. Strutts thinks she has only got to send in a bill like this for him to sit down and send off a cheque by return she will find herself mistaken. He won't pay a halfpenny without a fully detailed statement. The whole thing is just a try on – and after we had that beastly drawing-room chair repaired at our own expense! Tim hopes that Mrs. Strutts will get someone like the Carters in her house next time, and then she'll see the difference between damages, and fair wear and tear. Do I realise – Tim says – that we paid for fair wear and tear in the rent (which was high enough in all conscience for a poky little den like Rokesby), and that therefore she has no right whatsoever to charge extra for it?

Reply that I do realise it, and that I agree with him but point out that she may have discovered for one thing that the leg of the small table in the morning room was broken.

‘You glued it on, didn't you?' Tim says indignantly. ‘Well then, what more can she want?'

There are one or two other small items which I have been slightly uneasy about. I review them hurriedly in my mind, but decide not to trouble Tim with them at present.

Tim now takes up the paper and reads aloud a long article about the financial situation of Britain and the possibility of the country being reduced to beggary in three years. Feel so depressed about everything that I refuse marmalade. Tim is astonished at this, as my fondness for marmalade is a family joke. He wants to know if I am ill, or only trying to save the country from bankruptcy. Reply haughtily that if everyone in the country gave up something, the saving would be considerable. Tim laughs, and says that is so like a woman – to throw away seven guineas on a perfectly useless dress and save a halfpenny-worth of marmalade at breakfast.