Company in the Evening

by Ursula Orange

  When she was gone I could only feel heartily thankful that I myself was going away the next day, and, when the next day came, a sudden mood of holiday-making and frivolity descended on me as a delightful unexpected present from the gods. This lightening of the atmosphere was much appreciated by Antonia, and our journey down to Sussex was quite a riot of merriment, with bars of chocolate produced at unconventional times, games played out of the carriage window and altogether never a dull or peaceful moment. Such was my mood that I actually enjoyed it.

  * * * * *

  Harry and Margaret Smith, the married couple who ran the hotel, were not intimate friends of mine, but I had known them for some years, on and off (off while I was married to Raymond, whom they had never met), and I liked them both very well in a cool way. Harry was very good-looking, very amiable and easygoing, and possibly a little weak in character. He had a game leg which had so far debarred him from military service, although it was possible he would be called up in the future. Margaret was about my own age, very capable, very straightforward and outspoken, and a trifle domineering in a way that was still amusing rather than offensive, but might quite well become the latter one day. I had always considered them an excellent couple to run a hotel between them. Harry supplied the charm and the air of easy Welcome, Margaret the efficiency, and, I believe, the original capital.

  The bungalow in the grounds of the hotel was really charming. It consisted of a big sitting-room, two bedrooms, and a bathroom, all very decorative and gay. I felt like a child playing at houses and loved it instantly. I had seen both hotel and bungalow, but never stayed there. It was an encouraging start to find it all nicer than I had remembered.

  Margaret, who came over with me, to unlock the door, explained very apologetically that only the day before an unfortunate accident had occurred to the window of the smaller bedroom. One of the children staying in the hotel had thrown a stone and broken it badly, and they had not been able to get it mended yet.

  “The mother was awfully apologetic, but all the same I could have smacked the little beast,” ended up Margaret, and then looked at me a trifle aghast, suddenly realizing, I suppose, that my own potential “little beast” was tripping along beside me, and also perhaps that she had previously assured me that children were heartily welcome. “I mean it’s an awful nuisance for you,” she added quickly. “Because I suppose you meant to put Antonia in the smaller bedroom, didn’t you? And I’m afraid it’s now a choice between leaving the black-out screen up to cover the hole and getting no fresh air at all or else taking it down and getting too much. The other bedroom—the bigger one with a double bed in it—has plenty of room for another bed for Antonia as well until the window’s mended, if you’d prefer to do that? Come and see, anyway.”

  I inspected the damage, and decided that it would certainly be the best plan for Antonia and me to share the big room. I did not really mind, and Antonia was delighted at the prospect—so delighted that (while slightly touched by her joy) I was obliged to remind her sternly that I was not going to permit any conversation at all until half-past seven in the morning.

  I saw Margaret give me an approving glance. She had no children of her own, and evidently liked to hear the law being laid down to other people’s. She was altogether rather a “no nonsense” person.

  We moved the divan bed from the smaller room into the bigger one, and then all went back to the hotel to tea. Antonia, I was glad to see, still giving her best impersonation of a friendly but well-conducted child.

  It was arranged that breakfast and supper should be brought across to the bungalow, and Antonia and I should have lunch and tea in the hotel.

  That evening after I had bathed Antonia and was just preparing to turn down the divan bed for her, Antonia stopped in mid-act of taking off her slippers and said suddenly, “Mummy!”

  “What?” I said. I knew that pregnant tone of passionate enquiry. Something terrifically important was coming.

  “Mummy. COULD I sleep in the big bed. COULD I—please.” (‘Please’ was an obvious afterthought, thrown in for a make-weight.)

  “Darling! Do you really want to?” I looked dubiously as the vastness of the double bed and the comparative smallness of Antonia’s night-gowned figure.

  “Yes, I do. I do really. I want it—more than anything else in the world!”

  I laughed. Bless her! I could see by her face that she was not exaggerating.

  There is still enough of the child in me to want small things passionately myself. There is not enough of the disciplinarian not to feel strongly tempted to grant ridiculous requests of the sort.

  “And me sleep in the little one, you mean?”

  A shade of half-doubtful apology crossed Antonia’s face, but she nodded vigorously.

  “Darling, you are a ridiculous sausage. Well, I tell you what.” (Appealing as she was, I still felt I ought not for the sake of principle, to give in unconditionally.) “You shall sleep in the double bed until I come to bed if you want to so much, and then it will be my turn and you must move over.”

  At least the thing had now been established on a basis of “turns.” It was the best the mother of an only child could do, artificial pretence as it was in this case. I did not really mind for myself in the slightest which bed I slept in.

  Antonia’s rapture as she clambered with some difficulty into the enormous bed and settled herself precisely in the middle, was amusing to watch.

  “It feels perfectly lovely,” she volunteered enthusiastically.

  I kissed her affectionately. She looked so utterly ridiculous and so utterly sweet.

  “Mummy?”

  “Yes?”

  “Are my slippers put properly. I can’t see.”

  Antonia’s habits with her slippers are one of the things that slightly appal me. Apparently they have to be ranged meticulously side by side before she can compose herself for slumber. This is her rule, not mine or Blakey’s—that is what appals me. The rest of the room, I am both glad and sorry to say, can be in as much disorder as it likes.

  “No, they’re not. They’re all over the place,” I said, teasingly.

  “Oh!” Antonia, concerned, began immediately to scramble out of bed again.

  “No, don’t get out. There! I’ve done it. Look!”

  Antonia peered over the edge of the bed and heaved a sigh of relief.

  “I was so excited I forgot,” she explained guilelessly.

  “Well, no more excitement now, and straight off to sleep,” I admonished, with a final kiss.

  Back in the sitting-room I grinned, in retrospective amusement, at the little scene that had just taken place between us. If Antonia had had six brothers and sisters, would the relationship between her and me be rather different?

  Yes, I admitted with a sigh, undoubtedly it would be. The bond between mother and child would still be there, of course, but it would be more diffused. I would be so busy tucking them all up in their cots and beds that I should have no time to consider one child’s whims over its slippers. Probably, I admitted with another sigh, that would be much healthier for Antonia.

  I had to comfort myself once again with the reflection that I always comfort myself with on the occasions when I feel a little apprehensive about the effects on Antonia’s character of being an only child. My consolation is this—that I personally have always found members of a really large family a little unsatisfactory as friends. So often they carry over into adulthood too much of the super-hearty atmosphere of their childhood. If “only children” grow up old for their age and precocious in intelligence, “big family” children seem, contrariwise, to suffer a little from arrested development. The corners have been too thoroughly rubbed off them in youth; and personally my preference is all for slightly “cornery” and individual adults.

  * * * * *

  My beautiful dream of the “children in the sandpit” and the bevy of mothers in the hotel all thanking me, did not precisely materialize. I did not mind as I was enjoying myself anyw
ay. As a matter of fact, there were only two other children in the hotel, one a little boy of eight (he it was who had thrown the stone), and one a baby girl of a year old. There was practically no game Antonia and these two could co-operate in playing, and any half-hearted attempts to make them resulted in a far greater expenditure of effort than simply leaving them alone, as all we mothers quickly realized. However, I was not going to be baulked altogether of my desire to play the gracious hostess, and therefore, early in the first week, invited the eight-year-old to tea on the second Saturday of my visit. His mother accepted gratefully for him, but said would I mind if she did not come herself? She had been invited out to tea with friends in the neighbourhood that day, and had accepted, thinking she would have to take Richard with her—but naturally it would be much nicer for him to go to me and play with my little girl. I could see by Richard’s face that his eight-year-old dignity was a trifle affronted by being offered the much younger Antonia as an entirely suitable companion, but he made no demur, and I was quite agreeable to having him without escort. A sandpit surely still pleased an eight-year-old?

  I debated whether to ask the year-old girl and her mother as well, but eventually decided against it. I did not care for Mrs. Massingham (such was her name), who struck me as querulous and fretful. Smugly I decided that she did not deserve such a lovely treat as I could offer. The withheld invitation would be my private punishment to her for complaining so boringly to me one afternoon about the hotel and all its inhabitants.

  Antonia showed no great enthusiasm for the sandpit during the first week of our visit. She had, after all, one at home, so it was no great novelty. The hotel itself was something really new however, and actually she much preferred it to the peace and privacy of the bungalow. The number of rooms, the several staircases, the waitresses all fascinated her. On the only really wet day she was extremely languid about the new painting book I competently produced, and only really cheered up when I suggested going across early to the hotel to tea. At her own request I walked her all over the public part of the building. It was agony to her that she could not look into the bedrooms, but she did quite well with “exploring” every bathroom and lavatory. After tea she demanded a repeat performance, and when I struck she settled me firmly in a chair in the lounge and then said could she please explore by herself? I knew I could trust her to be quiet and discreet in her bearing, and so, somewhat rashly I gave her permission, and then spent a rather agonized moment, immediately after she had run off, thinking that she would now certainly get shut by accident into some bathroom and be unable to get out. However, in five minutes she reappeared, whispered importantly, “Mummy! there are seven bedrooms up the first staircase, three bathrooms and two lavatories—now I’m going up to the next to count,” and trotted off again. A little later she returned with a further batch of staggering statistics, including the information that on the top floor was a sort of cupboard room with a sink and brooms. Would I call it a scullery?

  “No, a housemaid’s cupboard,” said Richard’s mother (with whom I had meanwhile started a conversation.) “How many cans had it got in it, Antonia? Did you count?”

  I recognized her as the best sort of fellow-mother—one who, when wanting to talk to me would never show by word or look that my child was in the way, but would, with an air of complete interest, suggest some occupation for Antonia to send her off., Thereafter I firmly squashed in my mind the mental vision of an imprisoned Antonia, and enjoyed an interesting chat with Richard’s mother about children, happily undistracted by their actual presence. We both of us agreeably suggested further variants on this evidently fascinating game of counting and reporting whenever Antonia appeared again, and finally Richard arrived and, as a culminating glory, took Antonia to see his bedroom. Antonia, who had received with extreme incredulity my earlier assurances that hotel bedrooms were “just like any other bedrooms, darling, just like ours in the bungalow” ran off delighted at the prospect; and, oddly enough, did not seem at all disappointed when she came back again, having viewed thoroughly the reality.

  That was Thursday. On Thursday evening, shortly after supper, when I was sitting in my bungalow talking to Harry and Margaret (who often dropped in to coffee with me, knowing that I would not leave Antonia alone in the bungalow after she was in bed) the telephone rang and the operator from the hotel told me that she was about to switch a trunk-call over to my extension.

  During the few minutes, that I waited, receiver to ear, I had time to imagine quite a lot of disturbing possibilities. My mind I am afraid, works that way. A trunk-call could only be from Harminster, I thought, and, if so, could only be to announce calamity of Some sort necessitating probably my instant return. Rene was ill? Mother had broken her leg? A stray bomb had fallen on the house?

  “Hello? Vicky?” said Raymond’s well-known voice.

  The relief was considerable.

  “Raymond!” I cried joyfully. “How ever did you know I was here?”

  “Rang you up at home and they gave me your number.”

  “Did they sound all right at home?” I asked a little absurdly. “Whom did you speak to, Rene or Mother?”

  “Your mother. Of course I was enormously interested in the situation, Vicky, but I could hardly ask them how they were getting on together, or what had driven you to this step. I was quite relieved to hear you had only gone for a holiday. For a moment I feared that you had abandoned the field of battle for good and left Rene in possession.” His tone changed as he added, “I’m awfully sorry to hear Antonia has been ill. It must have been horrid for you.”

  “Oh, Mother told you that, did she?”

  I did not altogether like the idea of Mother and Raymond chatting together. Raymond, of course, guessed as much from my tone.

  “Your mother recognized my voice at once. Obviously a pleasant chat together was inevitable. She was very nice—not dramatic at all. It doesn’t matter, does it?”

  “No, no, of course it doesn’t,” I said hastily.

  “You didn’t tell me you were going away, Vicky. I rang you up in the first place to propose next Saturday for our outing together. But of course I suppose that’s off now?”

  “Oh Raymond! I’m so sorry, I’m afraid it is. I’m here till Monday, and can’t very well leave Antonia.”

  “That’s all right. It was very short notice in any case. The invitation still holds good for later on, does it?”

  There was only good humour and politeness in Raymond’s voice, and this had the effect of making me feel something of a cur. I had, after all, known about my holiday, when Raymond had first proposed this outing, and had not mentioned it. I had accepted gratefully his very kind proposal to devote a Saturday to me, and yet held him off to the extent of not telling him even about Antonia’s illness.

  “Oh Raymond! I am sorry,” I repeated, and then added impulsively, as a sudden thought struck me, “Look here, though. If you are free next Saturday couldn’t you come down here for the day instead? It’s only just over an hour from London. Do!”

  I could feel a slight hesitation over the wire, and added, with the strongest desire not to press him to do anything he did not want to, “Although of course I think it only fair to warn you that the only entertainment offered is a mild children’s tea-party in the afternoon and the rather humorous spectacle of me playing the competent mother to Antonia.”

  I wanted to reassure him that the atmosphere would be in no way sentimental or intense. I had become a little conscious of the presence of Harry and Margaret, who had meanwhile been behaving as we are all forced to behave while obliged to listen in to a private telephone conversation—that is keeping up a polite pretence of chatting in subdued voices to each other—and thought it as well at this point to apprise Raymond of their presence. “Harry and Margaret, who run the hotel, are friends of mine you know. They’re in the bungalow with me now, as a matter of fact. We might all have a slight party together at some point.”

  “Well I don’t think I can resist the
splendid offer of a children’s party and a grown-up’s party on the same day,” said Raymond, laughing. “Thank you, Vicky. I’d love to. Do you know anything about trains?”

  “Oh—Harry will come and tell you all about those,” I said, and held the instrument out to Harry. “Will you, Harry? I know you know them by heart. Thanks awfully.”

  I resumed my seat, slightly surprised at this sudden turn of events and yet not at all displeased. I would never have thought of asking Raymond down, had he not happened to ring up, and yet after all why not? Why shouldn’t he see Antonia sometimes? And what better opportunity could there be thaw in the comparatively impersonal atmosphere of a hotel with no Rene to be embarrassingly present or as embarrassingly tactfully absent?

  Harry concluded his conversation with Raymond and rang off. I suddenly realized that, by mentioning Harry and Margaret to Raymond and explaining them as friends of mine, I had let myself in for some sort of explanation to them as to his identity. Hitherto I had vaguely supposed that the question need not arise. Neither of them had ever met him, or I would have avoided the whole situation.

  If anything was going to be said, obviously it had better be said at once.

  “You may well be wondering if that is the Raymond I married,” I said with a laugh. “And, as a matter of fact, it is. We’re perfectly good friends and meet from time to time, and this seemed a good opportunity.”

  Harry and Margaret are by no means an unsophisticated couple. They agreed calmly that it was an excellent idea. Harry said that he had offered to motor Raymond to Hayward’s Heath after dinner on Saturday so that he could catch a later train back to London than would otherwise be possible. I saw Margaret dart a slightly watchful glance at Harry when he said this (her line had always been that Harry put himself out too much for the hotel guests) and I thought it a tactful moment to invite them both to come over to the bungalow after dinner on Saturday and have drinks before Raymond went. It was rather awkward carrying glasses over from the hotel bar, so I would, I said, lay in a bottle or two of my own and it should be my party. On this suggestion, which pleased everybody, the evening concluded happily.