III

THE TWENTY-EIGHTH OF SEPTEMBER

Justin Bray was entertaining three ladies of title to tea. It gave him a very faint glow of snobbish satisfaction, such as he himself had ridiculed in one or two of his novels. But can any­one satirise a foible without in some degree sharing it? One can denounce, one can express indignation or contempt, but one cannot parody without a fellow-feeling.

The Lady Victoria, the oldest of his three guests, was gazing meditatively round the room, while the other two women talked together and their host busied himself with preparations for tea. Her eyes passed over the thick, crimson velvet curtains, their pelmets fringed with gold tassels, the ivory panelled walls broken by oil-paintings of the Italian school—a Marieschi, a Tiepolo, a Magnasco—a big break-front secretaire-bookcase the shelves of which were filled with beautiful bindings, a flat-topped knee-hole desk covered in red leather and littered, but not untidily, with books and papers, an exquisite little cabinet lit up to display a few china figures,—Bow, Chelsea, Longton Hall—some fine Persian rugs almost hiding the parquet, a pair of damask-covered wing-chairs, a sofa covered with chintz, a pembroke table supporting a silver-gilt tray—Paul Storr, perhaps?—a Chamberlain-Worcester tea-set, and last of all, her host stooping over the hearth for a dish of hot currant tea-cakes,—tall, rather stout, round-shouldered and grey-haired. His thick neck seemed hardly strong enough to support his large oblong face, with its bushy grey eye-brows and moustache, wide-set liverish eyes, full nose and fleshy jaw. He had long legs, long arms and long nervy fingers with very white nails.

‘Oh, Justin, I can’t say how I envy you! It carries me back,—it’s really almost painful. All the same, it’s nice to think that in a few privileged spots the flag of our civilisation is still flying.’

Justin gave a deprecating smile of embarrassment; for he found the implied comparison between his own affluence and Lady Victoria’s extreme poverty a little painful. He said, ‘You mustn’t judge my life by the few bits and pieces I’ve managed to save from the wreck.’

Lady Beatrice shook her head provocatively and said, ‘Come, come, Mr Bray, you can’t deny it. You really are dis­gracefully comfortable. I know bachelors, although they’re so helpless, always seem to get along better than spinsters, but I don’t know anyone nowadays who lives in quite such a luxuri­ous lap as you do.’

She tittered, as though she had said something not only clever but a little naughty.

Lady Farless on her right exclaimed, ‘The cleaning! How is it done?’

Lady Beatrice nodded vigorously. ‘Yes, Mr Bray, the clean­ing. I don’t believe you even know how to use a Hoover. Do you ever do any dusting? Do you wash those adorable pieces of china? Do you polish your furniture? Do you clean the grate? (By the way, what a glorious chimney-piece. Your Miss Tredennick certainly had good taste, if she put it in.) Do you ever furbish up those handsome books of yours? Even in the good old days, my brother used to polish the leather bindings himself, and he had an enormous library. Who does it all for you?’

‘The daughter of the house. Her name is Magda.’

‘What—Miss Tredennick’s daughter?’ Lady Beatrice gave a little scream. Justin thought, ‘What a very silly woman she is.’ (Phrase for a novel,—one of those women whom only a fool would know, if they hadn’t a title.)

Lady Farless, though her acquaintance with Justin was slighter than that of the other two women, was better informed and enlightened her. ‘Miss Tredennick isn’t Mr Bray’s land­lady,—at least not ostensibly. She’s let the whole house, or made it over, to an old servant of hers who married a German called Müller. The invaluable Magda is her daughter.’

Lady Beatrice, who did not relish being corrected by Lady Farless, sought another subject for conversation. As soon as tea was well under way, she said, ‘Now, Mr Bray, we want to know all about your last book. Seven Silent Sinners. Such a wonderful title. However did you come to think of it?’

Justin smiled mysteriously. ‘Well, you see—there are seven people living in this house.’

‘That gives you the number,’ said Lady Victoria, rousing herself from her memories of the past. ‘But are you sure you all sin?’

Justin answered, ‘I think we do, you know.’

Lady Farless, who, unlike the other two, had read the book, said, ‘But, Mr Bray, there’s no——’ Before she reached the word similarity, Lady Beatrice gave another of her shrill cries and asked, ‘Do you all sin in the same way, or have you allotted a different sin to each character? I’ve got your book, of course, but I’ve so very little time for reading nowadays. However, I promise I’ll make a start on it to-night. I’m dying to find out what your particular sin is.’

Lady Victoria said, ‘I think you’ll find it a very innocent one. Being a little too fond of pretty things, perhaps, instead of practising self-denial and doing what we used to call good works.’

‘But the Welfare State has abolished charity, like so many other old virtues. No, it must be something else. Still, perhaps it isn’t very tactful to cross-examine poor Mr Bray about it. I hear the book is selling very well. I do hope it is.’

‘No, not very well,’ said Justin. ‘In fact, you’ll hardly find it in a shop-window.’

Lady Farless announced, ‘I saw a pile of five in Garrows yesterday. Not the main table,—the small one on the left as you go in from the lift. I think the jacket might have been a little brighter, don’t you?’

Before Justin could agree or disagree, Lady Beatrice said, ‘At any rate, the notices have been wonderful.’

‘Do you think they have?’ Justin asked rather acidly. He was always irritated when he heard people call reviews notices, a word which, however aptly it described the criticism of trivial productions, such as ballets and musical comedies, struck a jarring note when used with reference to anything really sacred like a book. Besides, he was convinced that Lady Beatrice had never read a book review in her life and wouldn’t know one if she saw it.

He went on, with a deliberate touch of pomposity, ‘Perhaps I’ve reached the age when one is more hurt by an unkind review than pleased by a kind one. Did you see what Fanny France wrote about me in The Striking Hour? She began by saying how incredible it was that in the twenties I was con­sidered to be dangerously advanced, a highbrowish enfant terrible, whereas now I am only fit to be read by elderly ladies wearing lavender-scented gloves. She did at least allow me the merit of a cultivated style, but James Lorry, in The Sunday Beholder, ripped even that to shreds. I think I know the nastier passages by heart. Let me see if I can recite them to you. “Still fettered by the rusty chains of an obsolete educational system, Mr Bray gives us the mixture as before. It is a mixture of stale platitudes unhealthily sweetened with a pinch of saccharine, that to our taste is almost nauseous. His inspiration seems to come exclusively from writers of his own calibre, who were discredited thirty years ago. His style is as laboured as theirs, but thirty years staler. His values are also theirs, but even less vital, since they hark back to a past which, for those writers, still had a kind of dim, egocentric life, but now appeals only to antiquaries. Beneath a thin show of objectivity, we discern the festering ulcer of self-pity, and at times the petulance of a tiresome child that sulks because it isn’t understood.”’

Justin paused, as though he anticipated cries of ‘Shame!’ But when these were not forthcoming, he continued, ‘After this fine preamble, Mr Lorry quoted one of my less inspired sent­ences—a clumsy one, I admit—I see now that I phrased it as I did to avoid ambiguity over a personal pronoun, but I ought to have taken more pains—well, he took this wretched sentence and browbeat me with it for half a paragraph. But this bores you. Please do have a cigarette. Lady Victoria? Oh, of course, like me you don’t smoke.’

As he spoke, he went to a side-table, picked up a mahogany tea-caddy case, opened it and looked a little puzzled. ‘Oh dear, there are only two Virginians left. I thought I emptied a packet of twenty into it a few days ago.’

Lady Beatrice said, ‘Do you think perhaps the invaluable Magda——?’

Justin shook his head. ‘Oh no, I’m quite sure she wouldn’t. I must be mistaken. Please don’t be deterred. As I said, I never smoke now.’

Lady Beatrice took a Virginian, and Lady Farless, after taking one from the compartment reserved for Turkish, which contained a great many, reverted to the subject of Justin’s reviews and said, ‘The Sunday Beholder is so dreadfully left-wing, I never take any notice what it says.’

Nobody contradicted her, and Lady Victoria, who had been busy with thoughts of her own, murmured, ‘You’d hardly think it, Justin, but I was once considered an enfant terrible.’ (Indeed, no one could think so, who saw her small, starved-looking body, her bluish skin and her trembling little hands. Yet she had a graciousness and a sweetness of which the other two women were devoid.)

Justin, ignoring both the last remarks, said introspectively, ‘The worst of it is, I’m not sure that James Lorry isn’t right.’

Then Lady Beatrice, feeling that it was high time that the conversation should be pulled together, asked, ‘Mr Bray, how many books have you published?’

‘Seven Silent Sinners was my twenty-fourth.’

‘Oh, but you should have a silver jubilee. You must write one more, to make up the twenty-five.’

The advice was meant to be encouraging, but even Lady Beatrice realised that she had put it rather tactlessly. It implied a number of unpleasant things,—not only that Justin’s twenty-fifth book would certainly be his last, but that he would be hard put to write it, and that even if he did succeed in doing so, the book’s only merit would lie in ending a series,—the merit of the hundred thousandth purchaser at Garrows’ sale, who received a free gift for having the luck to complete such a spanking total.

Lady Farless thought the whole subject should be dropped.

She said, ‘Oh, Mr Bray, I’ve a piece of news for you. I spent a fortnight in Cornwall this summer with some friends and they remember your Miss Tredennick quite well. Do you know, they said she wasn’t Cornish at all? Her grandfather—or it may have been her great-grandfather—who was more or less a self-made man, took the name simply because he liked the sound of it. Later, Miss Tredennick’s father sold the family business, left the Midlands and bought Polvannion, where he passed as the genuine article. He sailed and fished and shot birds and had them stuffed and sat over his port after dinner reading Horace. Has Miss Tredennick ever told you her father read Horace?’

‘Oh yes, she has. She can even quote one of the Odes—

Aequam memento rebus in arduis

Servare mentem. . . .

I forget it now. I’ve never discovered if she can translate it.’

Lady Farless, who had once gone to tea with Miss Treden­nick, tried to patronise her and was snubbed for her pains, continued, ‘I can’t think she was ever an attractive woman. She suffers too much from acidity to have any charm. Do you like her, Mr Bray?’

‘Yes, I quite like her.’

‘That means you don’t, of course. I wonder if anyone does. Do you think her ex-maid, your treasure’s mother, really cares for her, or is she hanging on for a legacy?’

‘I think Mrs Muller is a very good woman.’

‘So she’s hardly one of your seven silent sinners,’ said Lady Beatrice.

‘She may have sinned, but be repenting for it.’

‘And the perfect Magda,’ Lady Farless went on, ‘what a time that girl has. Of course it must be a pleasure to look after you, but if she has to spend all the rest of her time dancing attendance on that old woman, I’m really sorry for her.’

Then Lady Victoria, who, if she was following the conversa­tion at all, was doing so at a distance of ten minutes, said, ‘Justin, do you remember the day I came to tea with your dear mother in your beautiful home at Haresley, and you came in and recited a very long piece from some Greek play you were going to act at school the next term? I can’t have been much more than twenty-eight, but I suppose I looked just as old to you then as I do now. Oh dear, how quickly this delightful afternoon has gone. Thank you so much for it. Let me see, the girl put my coat on a table in the hall, I think.’

Justin said, ‘I ordered a car to take you back. It should be here in about five minutes.’

‘But that was most wrong of you. No, I’m not even going to thank you. I can still get on buses and I want to do it as long as I possibly can. I love them.’

It was a chance for Lady Farless to let it be known that she never used such a means of conveyance.

‘But don’t you find the conductors terribly rude? I’m told they simply show no respect at all.’

‘Why should they? They help me on and off and see to my parcels if I’m carrying one, and call me “Mum” or “Ducks”, which I adore. And nobody ever gives them the smallest tip. Try that on a taxi-driver and see what happens!’

Lady Beatrice said, ‘I agree to that,’ and Lady Farless, making it quite clear that she never used taxis either, added, ‘Yes, I’m told they’re just as bad. What are your views, Mr Bray?’

‘Like Lady Victoria I take buses whenever I can—and make it a point of honour to climb the stairs to the upper deck. I devoutly hope I shall die before that simple pleasure is taken from me.’

Lady Victoria shuddered and said, ‘Oh, Justin, don’t talk of your dying,’ while the other two women made deprecating noises. The front-door bell rang and Justin went into the hall. When he was out of earshot, Lady Beatrice said, ‘I’m afraid he is looking older than when I saw him in the early summer.’ Lady Farless agreed. ‘It must be that book of his. Between ourselves, I did manage to finish it, but found it heavy going. Well, I think it’s time we heavily went ourselves. Can I give you a lift? My car’s in the Crescent. My chauffeur said he thought he’d better park there, as this street was so full of cars when we arrived. Oh, Lady Victoria,—if only I’d known you hadn’t a car, I should have been delighted to take you home.’

Lady Victoria smiled and said, ‘That’s very kind—but even so, I should have preferred to go home by bus.’

Justin came back. ‘Yes, Lady Victoria, your car is here. But really there’s no hurry. Won’t you have a little sip of brandy before you go? After tea is an excellent time for it. Are you quite sure? What about you, Lady Beatrice,—and you, Lady Farless?’

Lady Victoria and Lady Beatrice shook their heads and smiled. Lady Farless also shook hers, but she didn’t smile, as she felt that Lady Victoria’s rejection of her car had been meant as an affront. (Thank goodness she still had a lot more money than these two daughters of impoverished earls.)

Half in and half out of the room, the farewells began. When the hired car had left with Lady Victoria, and the backs of Lady Beatrice and Lady Farless could be seen crossing the end of the road into the Crescent, Justin turned round and saw an angel-face beaming up at him from the area. He quite liked Hugo,—more sincerely than he ‘quite liked’ Miss Tredennick.

‘Oh, it’s you! Have you been spying on my guests?’

‘No, Mr Bray, I didn’t come out for that. I’m not a spy, though they said my father was one.’

‘Who said that, Hugo?’

‘Oh, the boys in Cornwall, when Mother brought me back there after the war. But I think they got it quite wrong.’

‘What do you mean?’ As Hugo didn’t answer, he added, ‘You’ll catch a cold in that thin pullover.’ Hugo looked at him intently for a moment, as if summing him up, then said, ‘Good night, Mr Bray,’ and went through the area door.

Justin looked at the sky, now dark with clouds and the coming of dusk, and then up and down the street which was empty except for a young woman who strode along it from the further end with a jaunty swinging of her hips. She wore a thin bright dress which fluttered about her knees in the rising breeze. When she came nearer, Justin recognised her as one of the lodgers who went in and out of Number Seven. Her body seemed alive with enterprise and appetites which gratification would only serve to renew. She was on the south side of the street, but as she passed, she turned her head and gave him a bold, interrogative stare. Justin turned his eyes again towards the sky, affecting to study it, and thought, ‘What a difference between her and those three women who have just had tea with me! If it comes to that, what a difference there is between her and me! And yet, she’s probably had more happiness already than any of us. Well, it isn’t my fault that I wasn’t born like her.’

He sighed with a stab of envy, went indoors to his room and sat down at his desk, alone.