“What the Bishop thought—if he is capable of thinking—would be so obscurely expressed that you wouldn’t know if he approved or not. Until you found that he’d adopted the idea and was passing it off as his own. And I must say, Custance,” he added shrilly, “the sight of the Bishop in a siren suit would be a phenomenon not without its own bizarre attraction.”
“Edward!”
His wife’s voice, breaking in on this dramatic duologue, was not the only thing which brought Mr. Custance to a stop. The keyword had done its work, and he looked round for a pencil and paper.
“Edward?” Mrs. Custance repeated, her voice hovering between anxiety and reproach.
“Phenomenon,” said Mr. Custance. He got it down on paper—the key-word and the first three words of the Greek quotation it had inspired. He placed the bit of paper carefully in the tobacco-jar and turned to face his wife.
Mrs Custance was fond of saying that she was just an ordinary woman, and in saying it she contrived to suggest that this was much the best thing to be. She was constantly on the watch lest her nearest and dearest should do anything markedly unusual; for an ordinary woman, to be consistent, must have an ordinary family circle surrounding her.
It was therefore extremely disconcerting to find her husband decrying his bishop, speaking aloud in a high unnatural voice, and addressing himself as Custance.
Her first thought, that he might be ill, was quickly suppressed; for twenty-seven years of married life had taught her that if Edward were ill he would tell her at once and not waste time writing things down on bits of paper. When he popped the paper into the tobacco-jar she knew instantly that it was something to do with his book, and this increased her annoyance.
She came into the room and closed the door carefully behind her—a familiar action which warned Mr. Custance that he was about to be rebuked. Except for themselves the vicarage was empty, but Mrs. Custance, in moments of stress, behaved as if there were a large staff of inquisitive servants clustered in the hall.
“What you imagine you’re doing—” she began.
“I was being Eustace Templer,” Mr. Custance murmured unhappily. It was no good trying to explain things to Amy, and even in his own ears the explanation sounded a bit thin. Clutching at a straw, he added that Eustace Templer seemed very pleased with Cassandra and had said she was doing wonders with Leonard.
“That doesn’t sound like him,” Mrs. Custance said coldly. “And it isn’t what you were making him say when I came in.”
Nevertheless, the atmosphere grew lighter. Few ordinary mothers can resist hearing their daughters praised. Edward Custance, guiltily aware that he was using Cassandra—and not for the first time—as a red herring, hoped it would be forgiven him. The thing to do now was to go on talking about Cassandra and Leonard, and so distract his wife’s attention from Eustace Templer and the Bishop.
“She seems to like the boy,” he said.
“Cassie is very fond of children,” said Mrs. Custance. “I hope she’ll have some of her own one day.”
Though he was careful to conceal it, Mr. Custance gave a little sigh. His manoeuvre had been all too successful, for Amy had forgotten her annoyance and was now embarking on her favourite subject: her hopes for Cassandra’s future.
“She’s young. We don t want her to marry in a hurry,” he said soothingly.
“She’s twenty-five. I was younger than that. And of course I could have married much earlier. I had plenty of opportunities,” said Mrs. Custance, tossing her head coquettishly, “but poor Cassie has so few. Sometimes I think we’re wrong to keep her at home.”
Mr. Custance was fond of his wife, but there were moments when she irritated him excessively. He knew perfectly well that she had been twenty-eight when she married him, that she had been leading a humdrum existence in her father’s country rectory and had been glad to leave it, and that it was to please her that Cassandra remained at home.
But his peace-loving nature—for so he chose to think of it— prevented him from challenging this collection of mis-statements. He remained silent.
The silence itself might have produced a disagreement, but fortunately an interruption occurred. The sound of Cassandra’s footsteps on the path outside, as she wheeled her bicycle along to the stables, attracted Mrs. Custance’s attention.
“There she is!” she exclaimed. “And it’s time for your meeting, Edward.” She looked at her husband, who was looking at himself in the mirror above the mantelpiece and gently smoothing his hair. It was a pity Edward was going bald, but it could not be helped. It was a pity Cassie had to be a governess, but at least she lived at home and could be nursed when she had a cold.
Just for a moment Mrs. Custance’s life seemed perfectly satisfactory, her worries and grievances receded, and she fell into a happy trance, in which her mind was occupied by thoughts of a new summer hat, a day by the sea, and a roast chicken for Edward’s birthday.
It was in this benign mood, a few minutes later, that she went out to greet her daughter. Cassandra had come in through the back door and was washing her hands at the kitchen sink. “The chain came off my bicycle twice,” she said. “I might just as well have walked.”
“It wants tightening up. You must take it to Bryce—or perhaps I could do something myself.”
Mrs. Custance spoke with assurance, for she had a remarkable talent for repairing mechanical defects. The vicarage clocks, the wireless, the family bicycles and even the aged car responded obediently to her ministrations. Since neither Edward nor Cassandra was mechanically minded they regarded her as a sort of minor magician.
“Oh, do try,” Cassandra said. “Bryce always takes such ages. Has Father remembered his meeting?”
“He’s just gone. Rather late, I’m afraid.”
“They’ll all be late, except Mrs. Midge. No one in Little Mallin has any sense of time.”
Mrs. Custance, who was punctuality itself, might have queried this, but she had something else to think about.
“Mrs. Midge?” she repeated. “Surely she isn’t on the committee?”
“Elected last time. Didn’t Father tell you? I suppose he forgot.”
“That wretched boy,” Mrs. Custance said obscurely. “And anyway, why should she be on? She hasn’t been here very long.”
Cassandra knew that her mother was a kind woman, always ready to help people in practical ways as well as giving good advice. Though she demanded conventional behaviour from her family she did not insist on it in her friends; Eustace Templer’s eccentricity, his sister’s extreme vagueness, the somewhat predatory outlook of Miss Fenn and Miss Daisy Fenn, were broadmindedly accepted. But this did not mean that her mother was completely tolerant, it simply meant that her tolerance was unpredictable. If one tried to define it, it would be like the graph of a fever temperature, rising to remarkable heights and sinking to alarming depths.
For no valid reason Mrs. Custance simply refused to like certain people; and prominent among these social outcasts was Mrs. Midge.
It was no good trying to argue Mrs. Custance out of her prejudices, but Cassandra, in spite of her twenty-five years, had not yet given up trying.
“Oh, Mummy, she came in the war,” she said. “And Lukin isn’t so bad really.”
Lukin was the wretched boy.
“She’s on the make. One of those social climbers. One reads about them, you know.”
Mrs. Custance was rather given to thinking in slogans, and such phrases as ‘a typical English family’, ‘people like ourselves’, and ‘the backbone of the country’ served her well. Like formal abbreviations they stood for ideals which she did not trouble to put into words.
“I don’t see much future for a social climber in Little Mallin,” Cassandra said. “We’re all much of a muchness, and anyway the Literary Institute is quite plebeian. Look at Bryce.”
“Ah, but she won’t stop at that. I wish Eustace Templer had never let her have that house.”
“I believe he wants it back.”
<
br /> The remark slipped out, and Cassandra at once regretted it. As daily governess to Eustace Templer’s younger nephew she spent a good deal of time under his roof, and heard, from Lily and Felix if not from Mr. Templer himself, a good deal about his intentions. But she was usually careful not to spread stories, partly because she thought it bad manners and partly because she knew that her mother, if her interest was once roused, was all too likely to take action.
“Of course that’s only an idea of mine,” she added quickly. “No one has said anything.”
Mrs. Custance nodded comprehendingly. She was familiar with village life; she knew it wasn’t necessary to say anything, the news circulated as if it were carried by the wind. “I expect he wants Prospect Cottage for his brother-in-law,” she remarked.
Prospect Cottage was where Mrs. Midge resided. It belonged to Eustace Templer, who lived at Prospect House farther up the hill. For years and years Prospect Cottage had been let to two old sisters. But in the middle of the war the sisters, unable to cope with housework, had retired to a private hotel, and though there were several people available locally who would have made good tenants, Mr. Templer had let the place to a total stranger. Nothing was known of Mrs. Midge except that she came from London, that she had a young son who was supposed to be delicate, and that she worked in a Government department which had been evacuated to Mallinford.
At the end of the war the Government department returned to its own home, but Mrs. Midge stayed on. While the war lasted Mrs. Custance had accepted her as part of the war-effort and had hardly troubled about her; it was only in the past year or two that Mrs. Midge had been transferred to the category which Mrs. Custance described as ‘people we could manage without’.
Cassandra, still hoping to lessen the effect of her remark, said that Prospect Cottage might not suit Colonel Ashford.
“It’s quite small, and awfully inconvenient,” she pointed out.
“It could be modernized,” said Mrs. Custance. “I don’t suppose he wants a large house; Army pensions don’t go far. And of course it would be nice for Isabel Templer to have her sister so near.”
Her expression suggested that it would be nicer still to get rid of Mrs. Midge.
“Well, don’t say anything, Mummy, to Miss Templer or anyone, in case they think I’ve been gossiping.”
“Of course not, darling,” said Mrs. Custance, who believed herself to be the soul of discretion. “Did you have a nice day?”
In the excitement of hearing about Mrs. Midge being on the Literary Institute committee and possibly going to be evicted from Prospect Cottage, she had forgotten to ask her daughter this customary, and rather irritating, question.
“Quite nice,” Cassandra answered. This was the customary reply, equally irritating to her mother who would have liked a detailed account of everything Cassie had said and done and eaten. But this evening Cassandra relented and added the information that they had had a boiled fowl for lunch and that Felix was not going back to school that term.
Mrs. Custance said she knew that; Mrs. Truefitt had told her in the post-office, both about the hen and about Felix. The doctor said he had been working much too hard and must have a complete rest, which was silly because boys of Felix’s age simply did not overwork.
“I think it was the measles too,” said Cassandra.
“I hope you won’t have to teach him as well as Leonard.”
“Oh no, he’s not to do any work. Anyway, I couldn’t take them both. Leonard is only just ten and Felix is nearly fifteen.”
Cassie had had a good education and Mrs. Custance believed her to be very clever and fully capable of instructing boys of fifteen. Nevertheless, she hated to think of her daughter being a governess. Of course, if Eustace and Isabel had not wanted a governess for Leonard, Cassie might have had to take a post in some school instead of living at the vicarage; and perhaps she might still have to do that, next year when Leonard grew too old to be taught at home.
Mrs. Custance, who had had the sketchy sort of education that was thought suitable, in her generation, for the girls of a large and impoverished family, and had managed very well on it, sometimes wished that Cassie had not been quite so lavishly educated; for without all those examinations and certificates no one would have wanted her as a governess. She had not foreseen, when she wrote for prospectuses and sewed name-tapes on three sets of everything and economized to pay the school fees, where it would all lead; she had simply wished for an intelligent and lively daughter who would shine in any society.
Things had turned out differently, but she had not yet given up hope. If only there were more young men in the neighbourhood, if only Cassie showed more interest in them, if only she did not have to be a governess! Thinking of Cassie’s occupation, her mind went back to Prospect House and its occupants. Eustace Templer was a bachelor, but he was sixty-six and thoroughly unreliable. Colonel Ashford had a wife already, and Felix, an orphan and presumably Eustace Templer’s heir, was only fifteen.
“I wish Felix was a little older,” she said.
“I think he’s rather a nice age,” said Cassandra. “He’ll probably be very silly when he grows up.”
Mrs. Custance sighed. The trouble was, Cassandra so often seemed to find the male sex silly when it grew up.
A Furrowed Middlebrow Book
FM14
Published by Dean Street Press 2017
Copyright © 1952 Elizabeth Fair
Introduction copyright © 2017 Elizabeth Crawford
All Rights Reserved
The right of Elizabeth Fair to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her estate in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 1952 by Hutchinson
Cover by DSP
Cover illustration shows detail from Farmhouse and Field by Eric Ravilious
ISBN 978 1 911579 34 2
www.deanstreetpress.co.uk
Bramton Wick Page 24
