“‘LADY WALMER’s reception on Thursday was one of the smartest of the many events of a full week, and the lovely house never looked better. The great glass doors were thrown open, and the arriving guests passed through the great hall up the white stairs, and at the head Sir George and Lady Walmer received. Amongst the guests coming and going into what was the fullest evening of the season, I saw—’” Helen laid down the newspaper. She looked across at Miss Brown.
“I don’t call this a very good sort of cutting, Brownie. Mum and Dad come right at the end, as if they were servants.” She picked up the paper again and read: “‘and Mr. and Mrs. John England.’”
“If you just paste them in the book,” Miss Brown retorted, “and don’t read them all out loud, we’d get on quicker.”
“They make very dull reading, anyhow,” said Elizabeth.
“They don’t all,” Helen argued. “Listen to this one.”
She looked back at a cutting already in place. “Mother wore a gown of white gauze striped in graduated lines with white moiré, a short embroidered corsage adorned with a ceinture and sash end of silver embroidery, finished with silver boules, the decolletage softened with a vest and sleeves of silver pailleted net and silver lace, the manteau de cour of white satin softened with tulle and trimmed with lilies of the valley and thick ruche of tulle bordering the train inside. We saw her go out. We should never have thought of all that to say about the dress.”
Elizabeth stuck a cutting into the book in front of her. “I shouldn’t want to say all that about a dress. Who cares, anyway?”
“Mum thinks Grandmother England cares, or she wouldn’t collect them like this. I often wonder what she’s like. I wonder what Grandmother Torrys is like, too.”
“She’s nearly ninety.” Elizabeth stretched out her hand for another paper. “I should think she’s shrivelled up like a mummy. Great-Aunt Rose told Mum she doesn’t care for much but her food now.”
“It’s lucky she doesn’t care about reading about Dad and Mum in the newspapers, or we would have to do, all this cutting-out and sticking-in twice over.” Helen picked up a paper and read the marked paragraph. “At the musical party Mother wore ‘an Irish lace tunic, a commingling of black Chantilly worn over oyster-white satin, the completing touch being imparted by grey velvet bows.’ Isn’t it awful, Brownie, to think that next year you and I will be cutting out what Betsy wore, and sticking them into a book? Just imagine, ‘Miss Betsy England wore a gown of baby-blue charmeuse, slightly draped and arranged with a bertha and sleeves of paste embroidery. A cluster of baby-blue ribbons were arranged in her hair.’”
“Oh, shut up,” Elizabeth growled. “You won’t hate cutting the bits out half as much as I shall having to wear the clothes.”
“What a pity it is,” said Helen, “that I am only thirteen. Years and years more of lessons. There’s you nearly grown-up and only wanting to go on doing them.”
Miss Brown skimmed through another paper and put a pencil cross against a paragraph.
“Going up to Girton is hardly doing lessons.”
“I don’t see the difference,” Helen argued. “It seems much the same to me.”
“It would.” Elizabeth cut savagely at a newspaper. “You only want to dress up and show yourself off.”
“And a very good thing too, dear,” Helen agreed cheerfully. “I want to do my duty in that state of life in which it has pleased God to call me.”
Miss Brown spoke firmly, scenting a quarrel. “Don’t be tiresome, Helen.”
Helen made a face.
“Well, Betsy’s so silly. She always wants things she can’t have, and goes on grumbling and grumbling. First she wants to go to a boarding-school, and then she wants to go to a college, and she knows quite well she can’t.” She turned to Elizabeth. “Can’t you see that Mum would never let you?”
“Even if I can see it,” said Elizabeth wearily, “there’s no reason why I should be pleased about it, is there?”
Helen dipped her brush into the paste.
“Only for the sake of Brownie and me. We get tired of hearing about it, don’t we Brownie?”
Miss Brown smiled at Elizabeth.
“Betsy knows just how keen I am on her going to Girton.”
Helen patted the cutting to make it lie flat.
“We’re a very upside-down family, really. Laurence is going to Oxford and he doesn’t want to, and Betsy always wanted to go, and now Jimmie has had to go to school and simply hates it, and Betsy always wanted to go and wasn’t allowed to. It’s lucky that I’m of such a contented disposition.”
Miss Brown threw her an amused glance.
“I wonder how contented you’ll be when I’ve got you all to myself. You’ll have to work then.”
“Well, thank goodness the holidays start in a fortnight.” Helen held out her hand for another paper. “Though I wish we hadn’t got to go and stay in that beastly Kent. No bathing, and nothing to do but to look at that dull old Manor. I wish I could go to Spain with Dad.”
Elizabeth looked up.
“He won’t take any of us. I asked him yesterday.”
“Did you?” Helen opened her eyes. “How mean of you not to have told me, and I would have asked him, too. What did he say?”
“Well, I didn’t catch him at a very good minute. He was trying to get something finished before he dressed for dinner, and you know how vague he is when he has just finished writing. He looked for a moment as if he might be going to say ‘yes’ and then he said, ‘Your mother wouldn’t like me turning you into a tramp. You’ve got to be a society lady, my dear.’”
“Well, if Dad’s going to tramp, I don’t want to go.” Helen threw down the paper she had been cutting. “Well, that’s the last. I hope dear Grandmother England enjoys this lot, because it’s all the reading she’ll get till the autumn, unless there’s a bit to say, ‘Mr. John England, the well-known writer, spent his holiday tramping in Spain.’” She stuck the cutting into the book. “Can I go,Brownie?”
Miss Brown nodded.
“You must be back in half an hour. It’s your turn to sit with your mother while she dresses.”
“There’s no need to remind Helen about that,” Elizabeth observed, as the door closed, “she likes it.” She got up and looked out of the window. “Sometimes, on paper-cutting nights, I feel I’d rather be dead than be me.”
Miss Brown looked at her sympathetically.
“It’s silly to talk like that.” She picked up the newspapers and rolled them into a bundle, and put them into the paper-basket. “Even if you do have to go in for a social life, you’ll get time to write and you will meet a lot of types.”
Elizabeth turned round.
“This sounds conceited, Brownie, but when I’m not doing lessons any more next term, won’t you find it dull teaching Helen?”
Miss Brown hesitated.
“It’s one of the funny sides of life, how the things you don’t want to do often turn out well. You want to get a degree and then go in for writing, and you think all the dances and things you will hate. Well, I wanted to be a doctor. It was out of the question. There was no money to train me for anything and I had to teach. First I taught in a school, but I hated it, and then after a time I came to you. You didn’t make my life any easier.”
Elizabeth laughed.
“I know I was bad-tempered.”
“Very. Then, when I was just thinking that I couldn’t bear it any more, your mother’s fund for governesses turned up. You’ve no idea how interesting that has been.”
“You only keep the books, don’t you?” Miss Brown smiled.
“That’s all you know. I’m not dependent on teaching for my only interest now. I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that governess fund, Betsy. In the autumn, when you’re supposed to be helping your mother, that’s one of the things that I think you’ll find interesting.”
“What! Paying money to a lot of old governesses. I can’t see what’s interesting in that.”
Miss Brown picked up the paste-pot. She moved over to the cupboard and stood in front of it.
“I think I’d better get that cupboard repainted. No good having one side of it marked ‘Betsy’ anymore.”
She put the pot away and joined Elizabeth at the window. “For someone who hopes to be a writer, you’re very unimaginative.”
“Why?”
“Well, shan’t I be an old governess?”
“You!” Elizabeth thought a moment. “Won’t you have any money when you’re old?”
“No. And all these people that the ‘Miss Long Memorial Fund’ supports were young once, too, weren’t they? Do you good to get to know some of them.”
Elizabeth frowned.
“I don’t feel I’ll ever be able to write living at home. I feel sort of shut in.”
Miss Brown picked up some scraps of newspaper off the floor.
“You’ll have your own money when you’re twenty-one. You can do what you like then. It’s only four years. I think it would be a good idea if you tried in those four years being pleasant to everybody. It will be a novelty for you, and you might find it interesting.”
Caroline and Laurence were gardening. Laurence straightened his back.
“You know, Mum, Uncle Ellison doesn’t keep this place too badly. After all, he never sees it, and to keep Bates for nothing but the flower-garden does make it all look nice. And it’s a good idea his paying Naomi to be about all the time, cleaning the place and opening the windows. It doesn’t look so awful, does it?”
Caroline laid down the basket into which she had been putting dead rose heads. She looked at the house.
“No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t look bad at all.” She twiddled her gardening scissors on her finger. “But I’ll tell you a secret, Laurie. It isn’t Uncle Ellison that pays Bates and Naomi, and Naomi’s daughter. I do.”
“Oh!” Laurence’s face expressed understanding. “I’ve always marvelled why he did it. Doesn’t seem like him. Does Dad know?”
Caroline flushed.
“I hate keeping things from your father. But, as a matter of fact, he doesn’t. I thought it was a mistake to tell him. It’s money I save out of my clothes and things. Some day I hope your Uncle Ellison will come to his senses, and when he does he’ll find it all in perfect order waiting for him.”
Laurence looked at her across the flower-bed with a smile.
“Does Dad know how much you come down here?”
“How do you know I do come down here much?”
“The people in the cottages. I’ve seen them when I’ve been out riding. Is it out of your money the repairs are being done? Or is that Uncle Ellison?”
“I don’t care for that man Penge that your uncle has as bailiff. He’s not a Kent man, and he doesn’t know the people. Besides, he’s only paid to be here twice a week. I will say that on those two days he’s very energetic, but he’s hard. Your uncle turned a lot of people off when he closed the house, and until they got more work there was no money for their rents. Fortunately, he had not been gone long when I heard about it. I was able to help. The people prefer dealing with one of us.”
“When do you get down? You always seem so terribly busy.”
“Every Tuesday. I’ve been coming for years.” Laurence grinned at her.
“When you’re supposed to be doing ‘The Miss Long Memorial Fund.’ What deceit!”
“It’s not really,” said Caroline quickly. “I can do ‘The Miss Long Memorial Fund,’ at any time and what I can’t do, Brownie does, bless her.” She looked rather shocked with herself “There was never any need to have a special day for the fund. I invented it.”
“You deceitful old woman.” Laurence jumped across the bed. “Come and walk with me. I’ve been wanting to ask you something, and I think this is a good moment.” He tucked his arm into his mother’s, and together they strolled up the lawn. “Do you think I could get out of Oxford. Would Uncle Ellison let me be his agent here?”
“Laurie!” Caroline stood still. Her face lit up. “Do you really want to?” Then she shook her head. “It’s not only Uncle Ellison. I’m afraid your father would never hear of it.”
Laurence shrugged his shoulders.
“Dad’s got to hear of it. He can’t make me go to Oxford. I’ve got some money of my own when I’m twenty-one, so he can’t push me into doing something I don’t want to. Why should I be a barrister? I don’t suppose I’d get through one of the exams.”
“Your father only said a barrister because he thought that if he chose something for you to do, it would help you to make up your mind.”
“But I have made up my mind.” His voice was eager. “Can’t you see, Mum? I could camp out in two rooms in the house, and Naomi, or that fat daughter, could look after me. There’s a lot of the timber wants seeing to, and then there’s quite a lot we could do to the house. If I was on the spot, I could see that Uncle Ellison got all the money he wants out of the place, and I could save enough to get the things done that need doing. The thing is, what’s the best way of getting at Uncle Ellison?”
Caroline walked for a moment in silence.
“Do you know anything about your Uncle Ellison?”
Laurence gave her a quick look.
“What sort of things about him?”
“Well, he’s a very sensitive person. He was as a little boy. Your father can’t bear even talking about him. He doesn’t understand his difficulties.”
“Perhaps he knows something about him that you don’t,” Laurence suggested gently.
Caroline looked up at the branches of a tree they were passing.
“That dead branch must come down. Oh dear, no. I know a lot of things your father doesn’t even know. But it puzzles me a little what he does with all his money. He’s quite a rich man, but he’s always in debt. I’m afraid he gambles.”
Laurence gave her a shrewd look. “You’ve been helping, have you?”
“Not much. Only twice. Each time he threatened to sell some of the land. Of course he mustn’t do that. One day he’ll settle down and be a good boy, and marry and have a little son, and then he’ll be terribly sorry he let any of the property go.”
“How old is he?”
“Still quite a boy. Twenty-eight.”
“Whom will Uncle Ellison leave this place to, if he doesn’t have a son?”
Caroline shook her head.
“The last time I paid some debts for him I asked that. I asked that, just in case anything happened, he made a will. There’s your Great-Uncle George’s grandson. He’s about Elizabeth’s age. I’ve never seen him, but I believe he’s a very nice boy.”
“What did Uncle Ellison say?”
“He didn’t answer himself. He never reads letters. That friend of his, rather a peculiar artist, Mr. Foldes, wrote and said that the mere thought of signing a will made your Uncle Ellison really ill. He said he himself would be over for an exhibition of his pictures this autumn, and perhaps I would see him and we could discuss a whole lot of things.”
Laurence flushed.
“I say, Mum, you’re not going to see him, are you? He sounds an awful fellow.”
“I don’t think he is, dear. And he’s a very clever painter. And in his way, I do think he tries to have a good influence on your Uncle Ellison.”
Laurence gave her an amused look.
“Oh, well, I suppose he won’t do you any harm. I say”—his face lit up—“do you think you could talk to him then about me? I’ll tackle Dad, as soon as he gets home.”
They had turned round and had walked back down the lawn. Caroline moved up the steps on to the terrace. She fingered one of the urns.
“If you come here as agent, you must see that some plants grow in these. They look terribly bare. I should like to buy two peacocks. There were always peacocks when I was a child.” She brushed a bit of earth off the side of the urn. “I think you had better leave all the arrangements to me, dear. I will talk to your father. I think it would be better.”
Caroline was reading in bed. She heard John’s step on the stairs. She looked at her clock. Nearly two. He had said he was going round to the theatre to see how his play was getting along. The theatre must have been over a long time ago. She sat up and tied a knot in her handkerchief. A reminder that she really must ask Lilias to dinner.
“Hullo.” John saw her light and came in. “Still awake?”
“Yes. Waiting for you. You’ve been so busy with your new play since you got back from Spain, that I haven’t liked to disturb you, but as you’ve finished to-day, I thought I’d get hold of you at once, before you started off on something else.”
“What is it?” John asked cheerfully. “One of your old governesses?”
“No. Don’t fidget round. Come and sit down.” John came over and sat beside her on the bed.
“It’s about Laurie. He doesn’t want to go to Oxford, he wants to be Ellison’s agent at the Manor.”
John rose abruptly. He put his hands into his pockets and walked up and down the room. There was a long silence.
“Would that make you happy?”
“Yes.”
“Would it mean his seeing Ellison?”
“I don’t suppose he would. Ellison’s never in England, as you know.”
“I don’t like your brother.”
“That isn’t fair,” Caroline protested. “You don’t know him. You’re angry with him because you know it worries me that he won’t live at the Manor.”
John gave a short laugh.
“I don’t care tuppence whether he lives at the Manor or not. But I know a good deal about him. I don’t like his friends, and I won’t have Laurie or Jimmie mixed up with him. Who knows, if Laurie was at the Manor he might not come over to stay, with some of his ghastly friends?”
“He’s not likely to.” Caroline pushed the pillows up behind her. “Some day I hope he’ll marry and settle down there, but he shows no sign of doing that yet.”
“Do you suppose that Ellison would let him take it on?”
“I think he might. Some arrangement will have to be made by which he doesn’t have to pay any more than he does that nasty man Penge. But Laurie will have his own money, and he could live rent free. Besides, as he won’t be going to Oxford if he goes there, you could make him an allowance until he’s twenty-one, couldn’t you?”
John came back and sat down beside her.
“I don’t like it. Apart from anything else, it’s a wretched future. Ellison might take it into his head to come back any time, and then he’s got no career.”
Caroline clasped her hands, as if the intertwining of her fingers gave her courage.
“You remember you asked me, after the first night of Candytuft, about my going about more and entertaining. I’ve done it, haven’t I?”
“You’ve been splendid. But how does that affect Laurie?”
Caroline paused, feeling for words.
“Our life isn’t quite what I wanted. You’ve become so important, we never seem to be in at all. I don’t see nearly enough of the children. I shall see more of Betsy now, of course; we hardly ever have evenings at home with them all. But it is the life you wanted, isn’t it? And because you’ve got what you wanted, I’m pleased. I want you to let Laurie do this, for me. I know you’ve never been able to understand quite what I feel about the Manor, but Laurie does; and he would be the perfect person to look after the place. He loves the people, he loves the house, he loves everything about it. It would make me really happy to feel he was there.”
“Oh.” John stooped down and took off his shoes. “If you put it that way, I suppose I shall have to agree. I don’t understand Laurie. I never have. To me it’s inconceivable that a boy with the chances he has, should have no more ambition than to go looking after a property for his uncle. However, if that’s what he wants.” He got up. “Well, my dear, I’ll go and get my things off.” He stooped and kissed her. “I’ll have a talk with Laurie in the morning.”
“Mr. Timothy Foldes,” Pells announced.
Timothy came in as if he had known Caroline all his life.
“Now isn’t this fun! After all our letters. Are you what I thought you’d look like?” He moved away from her and put his head on one side. “New century, with a whiff of our late lamented Victoria, just for remembrance. How clever of you to find this house. Isn’t it charming? I’ve always said that if you are condemned to live in London there’s only one part in which to live, and that’s Chelsea. You must come and see my pictures. The Press are growing kinder and kinder, which makes me feel depressingly Sir Frederick Leighton.”
Caroline managed to break in: “Do sit down.”
Timothy sank gracefully into the chair beside her. He hung his hand prettily over the arm.
“Your brother, Mrs. England, is bringing his poor friend’s grey hairs in sorrow to the grave. What a naughty boy!”
“How is he?”
“Restless, very restless, poor fellow.”
“It’s a pity he’s so fond of gambling.”
“But how true,” Timothy agreed cheerfully. “And what’s the point? That’s what I’m always saying to him. It’s only fun when you’re at it. If you lose you can’t sleep. If you win you sit up all night. Why have a bed at all?”
Caroline leant forward.
“Mr. Foldes, I asked you to come here because I want you to do something for me. My eldest boy, Laurie, is nineteen. He was to have gone up this term to Oxford, to read Law. But he has no taste in that direction. What he wants to do is to be his uncle’s agent at the Manor.” Timothy moved to speak, but Caroline held up her hand to stop him. “It won’t cost Ellison any more money than it costs him to keep the man Penge. Ever since Ellison went away I have been supplementing the staff down there and, considering, the place is not in bad order. But if Laurie went there it could be its old self again. He could manage with just two rooms. My old nurse, Naomi, is married to Bates the gardener, and their daughter could look after him. I know Ellison would not read a letter from me, he won’t open letters from his family, I quite realise that; and I don’t suppose he would see me if I went over to Paris, so I want you, if you will, to try and arrange this for me.”
Timothy opened his eyes.
“You know, I’ve been wondering what you wanted to see me about. It’s not customary to invite the snake into one’s grass.”
“No,” Caroline agreed. “I expect you thought I was going to do what so many of my relations have done, implore you to send Ellison back to England. But I have realised for some time that would be hopeless at present. But it won’t hurt you, Mr. Foldes, to do this for me. It will make no difference to Ellison if Laurie is there. It’s a convenience—isn’t it?—to have me to write to when Ellison’s in trouble. That’s why I’m asking you to do me this favour.”
Timothy tapped his fingers on the arm of his chair. “Ellison can be so difficult.”
Caroline looked him straight in the eyes. “Ellison would do anything for you.” Timothy got up.
“Well, I’ll see what I can manage, although really, you know, it’s a mistake spending any money on that place. The architecture is shockingly mixed. I can see you don’t agree with me. Well, it’s your money. I must fly. It’s been enormous fun meeting, hasn’t it?”
Caroline rang for Pells.
When the door closed she dropped her face into her hands and shuddered. Then she turned to the window and flung it open.
“Goodness, Mum, what a tearing draught, and all the rain is coming in.”
“I know, darling. But this room needed airing.”