Snobs by Julian Fellowes (18 page)

But although she had already decided that resuming a London life would not be sensible for her, Edith had not at this point fully articulated her objections to it. She would murmur that it was a 'bad idea' without specifics. She explained these feelings to herself with observations on how 'left out' Charles would feel with her friends. After all, his London acquaintance was tremendously similar to the people they spent their time with in Sussex. And anyway it was true, or sort of true, when she told people how much he hated London and that (at this stage at least) she too had 'come to the end of it'. Still, she was aware that she was talking about being in London with Charles. There was already a potentially fatal sense that it might be more amusing, and therefore more dangerous, to be in the capital on her own. Even so, it was only occasionally, and then in a very faint voice, that she actually admitted to herself she was ready to take a lover.

Edith prided herself on having become, more or less instantly, a Great Lady, on obeying all the rules of her new life as one born to it. Of course, by this time, she had pretty well lost touch with the fact that she was
not
born to it. She had succumbed to her mother's self-image, and now imagined, in some mysterious way, that she had grown up in the Gentry and simply married into the Nobility. This was completely untrue but as an argument it had the supreme merit of allowing her to feel less grateful to Charles than she had formerly felt obliged.

Inevitably, part of her newly acquired rank was the morality it brought with it. She had proudly discarded the last traces of middle-class fastidiousness and assumed, without a struggle, the cold, hard-headed values that were the other facet of the Great World whose cause she had espoused. She had rapidly become one of those flawlessly-dressed women who lunch together and say things like: 'Why did he make such a fuss? The two boys were definitely his', or 'Stupid woman, it would have blown over in a year or two', or 'Oh, she doesn't mind a bit. Her lover's just moved here from Paris', and they lower their voices conspiratorially, half hoping to be overheard, as they bite into a leaf of radicchio. She had acquired the pretended horror of publicity and the genuine horror of scandal that are the hallmarks of Charles's class. And yet there was something truly felt even in these stock attitudes. Edith did not admire scandal. Above all, she did not admire people who had 'brought it off, and then 'made a mess of it'. She had brought it off and she had every intention of dying in the saddle.

And yet… and yet… with all these thoughts floating through her brain, she took another bite of toast and decided that perhaps she would, after all, go down with Charles to see Brook Farm.

===OO=OOO=OO===

She did not need to tell me later that she had gone on the tour of inspection, as I was watching from one of the windows on the Garden Front when they set off. It was our second day in the house and we were having one of those bitty, unsatisfactory mornings of being filmed coming out of doors and walking up and down corridors. All very useful to get the feel of a costume, of course, or to make friends with the cameraman, but not exactly demanding. Bella was sitting next to me on the window seat, laced into a brown travelling outfit this time, busily engaged in rolling a rather meagre cigarette, this habit being the last obvious trace of her earlier, sixties bohemianism. Simon was with us but not in costume as he was not called that day. He was simply one of those actors who cannot stay away from the set, who would rather be called for a one-minute pick-up shot and spend the day waiting in makeup, than actually take some time off.

'Where are they going?' said Bella, as we watched the pair of them strike off across the park.

'Charles said he'd look over the farmhouse for us, and see if anything needed doing.'

'How long before we can move in, do you think?'

I shrugged. 'Straight away, I gather. If we don't mind roughing it a bit.'

'God knows I'd sleep on a mountain side rather than spend another night in that hotel,' said Bella with a wry laugh as she held a flame to her apparently non-flammable, little smoke.

Simon took another look at the departing figures below. 'I think I might go up there with them. I can tell him if he's fussing unnecessarily. After all, we want to get in tonight if we can.' He nodded and walked off down the corridor. Bella and I watched him go in silence. She spoke first.

'Off he goes. To break more hearts.'

'Don't you like him?'

She bent down to concentrate harder on her dingy little fag. 'What's not to like? I just get a bit worn out with all that charm.'

'I shouldn't think Charles would notice it,' I said.

'Maybe not. But she will. And judging by last night I'm not sure she'll like it much. I hope he doesn't bugger things up before we've even moved in.'

He didn't. Or not enough to prevent us taking up residence that night. We had broken for lunch and were sitting at a rickety caterers' table on the gravel in front of the house, making the best of our cardboard lunch, when Simon returned in triumph, dancing and punching the air as he spoke. 'We're in!'

'When?'

'Today.'

'What about the hotel?'

'All done. I've given them notice for the three of us and told them we'll be back to pack and pay as quickly as we can. They're making so much money out of the film they didn't complain too much.' He beamed. 'Edith and Charles have asked us back for supper tonight so we don't have to worry about any shopping.'

'But how very generous of Edith and Charles.' Bella let the unaccustomed names linger on her tongue with a conspiratorial half-smile at me. I could see that Simon was destined to give her a great deal of amusement.

It was of course rather a bore to have to return to Broughton for the second evening running and make more polite conversation with 'Tigger' and 'Googie'. Bella and I confessed later that we had each privately thought of chucking. I would imagine that Simon had no such scruples. But in the event we came independently to the conclusion that it would have been a churlish return for what was both a favour and a dramatic improvement in our lot, so once again, shortly after eight o'clock, we crunched our car to a halt and made for the front door.

Simon was a changed man. The night before, his general braggadocio (unbeknownst to him, of course) had betrayed his social unease even to the unobservant. He had dropped names that had no kudos and spoken of social events that had either no currency value or with which he was clearly completely unfamiliar. In the end it was hard to resist a twinge of sympathy for his gaucheness despite the success he was having with his hostess. Like many actors, or civilians for that matter, he had been caught out by the need to demonstrate his right to belong in a world that he had long claimed as his own but seldom, if ever, penetrated. Tonight, however, he was free. He had that glow that distinguishes the insecure egomaniac when they find that their doubts were ill-founded and that they are
liked.
It was hard to avoid catching Bella's smiling eye as we made our way up to the family drawing room, with Simon trailing his hand along the gleaming banister and chattering amiabilities to the butler all the way, very much the Friend of the Family. Once there, we witnessed him greeting both Lord and, particularly, Lady Uckfield as Old Pals.

Of course, one of the basic truths of life is that, as a general rule, the world takes you at your own estimation. Just as the inexperienced hostess will tremble over her guest list, pondering endlessly whether or not she dare invite some grandee or media personality she hardly knows, only to discover in later years that nobody usually questions anyone's 'right' to send them an invitation. If they want to go, they will accept. If they don't, they won't. So, now, it would not have occurred to Lord Uckfield to ponder whether or not Simon Russell was his social equal. He appeared to consider himself so, and that, coupled to the fact that his role in Lord Uckfield's life consisted of eating dinners and telling funny stories, more than justified his amiability and relaxation in the peer's eyes. Just so are many social careers, particularly in London, constructed. Simon was no different to the art-dealers and opera-enthusiasts that are taken up by the various duchesses of our day, whose grinning images, sandwiched between media personalities and the wives of the heirs to great fortunes, are glimpsed in magazines. Of course, such people, like Simon, are generally unaware that beneath the superficial acceptance that their charm and easy manner can gain for them, their grand hosts do not seriously consider them to belong to their world. It is sad to watch the 'walker-favourite' of a great family arrive, after years of drawing-room service, at a public event — a wedding, say, or, worse, a memorial — only to find that they are placed in the back pew between the local MP and the central heating duct, while half-known and much disliked grandees are shown up to the front. Such is life. Or such, at least, are the values of this life. Something that Simon Russell was quite ignorant of, and Lady Uckfield knew very well indeed.

What interested me this evening, however, was not Lady Uckfield's response to Simon, which was predictably one of careful amusement, but Edith's. The sulks and rather affected hostility of the previous night had gone and been replaced by a mannered silence. She was looking more beautiful than she had been the evening before, in a black skirt and cream silk top, with some pearls at her throat and another string wound round her wrist in a chunky tangle. For want of a better word, she looked sexier than I had seen her since her marriage. She had not abandoned her cold
hauteur,
which I truly believe was already unconscious, but as we walked in, she looked up from the sofa with the kind of measured glance that I have learned from experience generally indicates that a woman means business.

Looking back, I am forced to conclude that Edith's plan to stay in the country in order to keep out of trouble was a poor one. Like some bored colonial wife in a hill station in India, the lack of sympathetic companions only really served to throw into advantageously high relief anyone who did make it to the outpost. I am not sure that if she and Charles had flung themselves into the whirl of parties, charities and all the other rubbish so eagerly awaiting them in London, that her virtue would have been in graver danger. I suspect it would have been quite the contrary. Society has the great merit of blunting the dullness of one's partner. The couple that never talk to each other never discover how little they have in common. Companionship, like retirement in the middle classes, can so often bring divorce in its wake. One thing I am sure of: in London, Edith would never have been attracted to Simon Russell. He was astonishingly good-looking as I have said, but in truth the trailer was better than the feature. He could talk and he was a really expert flirt, a joy to watch in action in fact, but when the chips were down and the doors were closed there was not much substance there. I do not mean to imply that I disliked him. On the contrary, I was extremely fond of him. And he could discuss mortgages or Europe or Madonna as well as anyone, but then couldn't Charles (at least the first two)? Of
the feu sacré,
that holy, charismatic flame that makes the world seem well lost for love, Simon had none at all. Or none that was discernible to me.

'Tell me, Mr Russell, what sort of acting do you like best?' This was Lady Uckfield. She was always careful to address strangers, especially those younger than herself as 'Mr' and 'Miss' or by their correct title. The main reason for this, indeed the reason for her whole vocabulary, was to underpin her image of herself as a miraculous survival of the Edwardian age in modern England. She liked to think that in her behaviour and manner people had a chance to see how things were done in the days when they were done
properly.
How matters would have been managed by Lady Desborough or the Countess of Dudley or the Marchioness of Salisbury or any of the other forgotten
fin de siècle
beauties who made their lives their art, which consequently perished with them. As part of this carefully studied performance, everything she touched was credited with uniqueness. She would speak of 'receipts' and 'luncheon' as she made a special point of her Irish ham ('dry and delicious and quite
unfindable
in England') or her French cherries ('I'm simply
stuffing
myself with them') or her yellow, American paper ('I find I just can't
write
without it'). The fun of this approach was that all her guests were blackmailed, on the principle of the Emperor's New Clothes, into agreeing that they could perceive an enormous difference in everything that was set before them, thus reinforcing the very prejudices that had made them lie. Actually, the food was always good and well-chosen so I was as craven as the rest in pretending to discern huge shades of taste between different types of asparagus or whatever the challenge of the day might be. And anyway, the more I came to know Lady Uckfield the more I came to admire the completeness of her self-image. She never took time off from being the ultra-charming but ultra-fastidious marchioness of the long Edwardian Summer. Never. I am sure that if she were going in for a potentially fatal operation, she would be fussing about the make of the surgeon's scissors.

Edith never understood the strength of her mother-in-law's chosen path. She thought her a fuss-pot and a pain in the neck. But Lady Uckfield had a self-discipline that would have kept Edith out of trouble. She did not know what it was to be bored — or rather, to admit to herself that she was bored. The fact she was married to a man who hadn't a quarter of her brain had never disturbed her conscious mind for half a second. Her road was chosen and she would make a success of it without pity or remorse. In our sloppy century, one must at least respect, if not revere, such moral resolution. And, after all, to borrow a phrase from Trollope, when all was said and done, 'her lines had fallen in pleasant places'.

The other reason that Lady Uckfield called Simon 'Mr Russell' of course, was to stop him calling her 'Googie'.