Civil to Strangers and Other Writings

by Barbara Pym

  ‘Then Mr Marsh-Gibbon’s nose would be put out of joint,’ said Edith astutely.

  ‘Oh, Edith,’ said Janie angrily, ‘you are the limit!’

  ‘I must go shopping,’ said Mrs Wilmot.

  In the town Mrs Wilmot met Mrs Gower, as she had hoped she would. They met in the grocer’s. When they had finished tasting and smelling the butter, an occupation of which Mrs Wilmot was very fond, they walked out into the street. Mrs Gower took Mrs Wilmot confidentially by the arm and almost dragged her into a narrow alley where some children were playing. This was a good sign. Mrs Wilmot bristled with anticipation.

  ‘Holmwood is let,’ said Mrs Gower in tones of satisfaction, ‘and to a foreigner!’

  ‘Oh!’ Mrs Wilmot gasped. ‘Are you sure it’s true?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Mrs Gower replied. ‘I saw him coming down the drive. Quite dark and wearing a black hat.’

  ‘Really …’ mused Mrs Wilmot, a smile stealing over her eager little face. After the black hat there could of course be no doubt.

  ‘And I heard him speaking,’ continued Mrs Gower. ‘In the Post Office. He asked for a three shilling book of stamps, only he said three sheeling.’

  ‘Well!’ Mrs Wilmot exclaimed. ‘But I expect he will be very nice,’ she added as they parted company.

  Mrs Gower shook her head doubtfully as she walked away, but very soon she was beaming on Cassandra and telling her the interesting news.

  ‘That would explain the funny-looking stove you saw going in,’ observed Cassandra sensibly.

  ‘He was very handsome,’ said Mrs Gower in a voice which made Cassandra feel that the ladies of Up Callow might be already turning from their dull husbands to this attractive foreigner.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘foreigners do seem to have a kind of glamour about them.’ But this was said in a matter-of-fact tone which suggested that she was thinking less of the glamour of foreigners than about what fish would tempt Adam’s delicate and capricious appetite.

  He had been particularly trying lately. He was at work on a difficult chapter of his novel, and it was not going at all well. The evenings were terrible, for Adam would pace about the house, not even sitting down to eat his dinner, and Cassandra would have to listen to long passages which he had written during the day and which had ‘something wrong’ with them.

  ‘Now, what is the matter with this?’ said Adam one evening, as they were drinking their coffee in the drawing room. ‘I feel that there’s something wrong with it, but I can’t decide what. I’ve tried to show the effect of this particular spring morning on a man who has hitherto found them all alike. At the beginning of the chapter I am quoting “It is the first mild day of March”, from Wordsworth, you know.’

  Adam began to read and Cassandra’s thoughts wandered to Mrs Gower’s speculations about the foreigner who had taken Holmwood. It might amuse Adam if she told him. But perhaps, she thought, glancing at Adam’s gloomy face, this wasn’t the right time to tell him anything amusing. It would have to wait.

  ‘Really, Cassandra,’ said Adam’s irritable voice, ‘I think the least you can do is to listen.’

  ‘Oh, Adam, don’t be cross! I was listening,’ she declared uncertainly, trying to remember what it had all been about. ‘I thought the description of the gardener’s vision was very nice.’

  ‘Very nice!’ repeated Adam in accents of fierce scorn.

  ‘This man is caught in the major experience of his life and you say it’s “very nice”.’

  ‘If you would like to read again what you have written,’ said Cassandra placatingly, ‘I’ll see if I can think of any more suitable criticism that will help you.’

  ‘Very well.’ Adam was a little pacified. He walked twice round the room and then began in a loud and startling voice, ‘“He stood transfixed upon his spade …”’

  Cassandra listened patiently. When he had finished there was a long silence.

  ‘I can see that you are impressed by it,’ said Adam, coming and sitting on the arm of her chair. ‘I think I may have been a little rude to you just now. Perhaps it is nice after all. “Very nice”,’ he repeated slowly. ‘I would much rather have a sincere criticism, and if you think it is very nice, then it is better for you to say so than to pretend you think something else.’

  He smiled and patted her lightly on the head, as one might a faithful, dumb friend.

  CHAPTER SIX

  ‘Thy sober Autumn fading into Age …’

  It was Mr Gay’s habit to take a little exercise before tea. This afternoon he thought he would walk through the park and then go past Holmwood, so that he might see the destruction of the elm trees for himself.

  It was pleasant in the park. The tulips in the geometrical flower-beds were at their best, and the water-lilies on the pool would soon be out. Mr Gay always felt sad when he passed through the park, although it was only a municipal one, with green-painted iron seats, waste-paper baskets and keep-off-the-grass notices. Nevertheless, it reminded him in a small way of the magnificent grounds he might have walked in had he made a profitable marriage.

  He came out at the other end of the park and went up the hill towards Holmwood. From there he could see the great bare spaces where the trees had been. He felt himself becoming a little breathless as the hill became steeper and began to wish he hadn’t come so far. After all, there was nothing to see, only a few tree-stumps, and it wasn’t as if he were like Angela and those other women, who were flocking round the place simply to get a sight of this foreigner.

  At the top of the hill, on the other side of the road, was Mrs Gower’s house. As Mr Gay came up to it, he saw that she was in the garden, doing something with a basket of young plants.

  ‘Good afternoon,’ she called out. ‘I see you’ve been looking at Holmwood. Are you thinking what a shame it is?’

  ‘I don’t like it. Those fine elms … ’ He was still very breathless.

  Poor Mr Gay, thought Mrs Gower. He looked rather tired. He was a handsome man, but how much greyer his hair had gone lately; it was nearly white. She would ask him in to have a cup of tea.

  ‘I wonder if your niece would mind if I asked you to stay to tea? Will she be expecting you back?’ she asked, looking up at him from under the brim of her big straw gardening hat, with its embroidery of gaudy raffia flowers.

  ‘Why … ’ Mr Gay was quite taken aback, and the offer of a cup of tea just at this moment when he wanted one so much was too good to be refused. Besides, Mrs Gower was a very nice woman, he told himself. She came of a good Shropshire family, he believed. He opened the gate and walked in, his bearing noticeably more soldierly, even a little jaunty. ‘This is most kind of you,’ he said.

  ‘You must excuse my old gardening clothes,’ said Mrs Gower, who was wearing a voluminous jumper suit of sage-green knitted material. The pockets of the cardigan sagged a little, from being filled with packets of seeds and gardening scissors, but if not elegantly dressed, there was, as always, a certain majestic dignity about her, and in its early days the jumper suit had been a very good one.

  Mr Gay gave a courtly little bow. ‘My dear Mrs Gower, you look charming.’ He waved his hand about, searching for a suitable phrase from Dryden or his favourite Pomfret to describe her, but not finding it he let his waving hand rest on one of the stone knobs of the gate posts. Indeed, he thought a few minutes later, as he sat in a comfortable armchair in a nicely furnished drawing room, with the clatter of tea-cups within earshot, at this moment she appeared to be quite the most charming woman he had ever seen.

  Over tea and hot buttered toast they talked mostly of the elms.

  ‘It depresses me so,’ said Mr Gay. ‘What I feel is that we shan’t live to see the day when Holmwood is once more surrounded by trees.’

  Mrs Gower nodded mournfully and there was a gloomy silence. ‘Do have a piece of this mocha cake,’ she said at last. ‘It is one of my cook’s specialities.’

  ‘Well, really, I hardly dare take it,’ said Mr Gay uncertainly. ‘What
I mean to say is that I like it very much, but another part of me doesn’t,’ he added, with an effort at jocularity.

  ‘Now, how funny,’ said Mrs Gower, ‘it used to be just like that with my late husband, but I wasn’t going to have my good cakes wasted, so I found a remedy.’ She got up and advanced majestically towards a small bureau in one corner of the room. Here she opened a drawer, and after looking for a few minutes, took out a small bottle of white tablets. ‘Here it is. Now do try one,’ she added in a tempting voice, as if she were offering him a sweet.

  Mr Gay looked at the proffered tablets rather suspiciously. He was now feeling ashamed of having admitted his weakness, and could not help wondering whether these tablets were the remains of those identical ones which the late Professor Gower had taken to aid his digestion, and, if so, whether they were still good after all these years.

  Mrs Gower quickly set his fears at rest. ‘I keep them in here because I occasionally take them myself,’ she admitted. ‘They’re quite fresh.’

  She sat down again, and with the little bottle of tablets on the table between them, they attacked the delicious mocha cake courageously. Mr Gay even had a second piece. No cake that his niece or their cook-general made had ever tasted like this.

  ‘Now just two of these little tablets and all will be well,’ said Mrs Gower. After this Mr Gay found himself growing quite confidential about his stomach and Mrs Gower responded, so that by half past five each knew just what the other could or could not take.

  At a quarter to six Mr Gay thought he ought to go. He was feeling greatly refreshed after the tea, and the rich cake had not so far had any ill effects. Mrs Gower too had been glad of company, and she was really pleased that she had been able to suggest a remedy for his trouble.

  As they stood in the hall Mr Gay noticed that in one corner there was an aspidistra on a little table. But when he looked at it more closely the tears almost came into his eyes, for it was such a sad contrast to those fine plants which decorated his hall. There was no gloss on the leaves and one of them was quite withered. He stopped by it and fingered the dead leaf tenderly. Mrs Gower stopped too.

  ‘I’m afraid it isn’t nearly such a fine specimen as yours,’ she said apologetically, ‘but then it’s old, and you can’t expect them to live indefinitely.’

  ‘With proper care,’ said Mr Gay sternly, ‘there is no reason why they shouldn’t live for ever.’

  Mrs Gower smiled as there rose up before her a vision of aspidistras, immortal, everlasting, the only living things in a dead world. ‘Now you mustn’t scold me,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid I know so little about them.’ Nor did she particularly like them, and only kept this one because it was a relic of that first house in North Oxford.

  ‘A little fertilizer, a little oil,’ repeated Mr Gay thoughtfully. ‘It’s so simple.’

  ‘Then I wish you would show me how to take better care of my poor plant,’ said Mrs Gower.

  ‘I will, if I may. It would be a great pleasure. Perhaps I may bring you some of the special fertilizer I use for my own aspidistras?’

  ‘That would be very kind of you.’

  ‘Not at all, Mrs Gower. You have done me a great kindness this afternoon, as well as giving me a delicious tea.’

  And so, uttering mutual expressions of gratitude they proceeded to the gate. Here they stood for a few minutes regretting once more the passing of the elm trees.

  ‘I wonder why they’ve left all the fir trees?’ said Mrs Gower. But before Mr Gay had time to answer, the sound of a car was heard. It stopped outside Holmwood and someone got out to open the gate. They saw a tall man of about thirty-five, wearing an overcoat of foreign-looking cut and a black hat. When he saw them standing at the gate he bowed and raised his hat, calling out in a deep voice, ‘What a beautiful evening!’ Then he gave them a brilliant smile and got into his car. They were both so surprised that by the time they had returned his greeting the car was halfway up the drive. Mrs Gower did not know what to say. He was even more handsome than she had remembered, with that lean face and flashing black eyes.

  ‘He’s very dark, isn’t he?’ she said non-committally.

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Mr Gay, thinking that he didn’t like the look of the fellow.

  As he walked down the hill he told himself that all these changes weren’t a good thing. But then he realized that he was feeling remarkably fit, that he had eaten two pieces of very rich cake for his tea and they weren’t disagreeing with him. Gradually his mood changed, so that by the time he was walking back through the park, in his new-found mood of benevolence, he began to think that it needn’t necessarily be a bad thing for this foreigner to come to the town. It might even be a good thing.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘Poor is the triumph o’er the timid hare!’

  Mr Paladin was writing home to his mother. He sat in his lodgings, crouching over the electric fire, for although he had just said in his letter that the weather was becoming warmer every day, the evenings were still chilly enough to make him realize that the heating of his room was inadequate. He hardly liked to go upstairs to fetch his rug, although it would have been comfortable to sit with it wrapped round his knees. If he did this his landlady might be offended, and it would look so odd if the rector called. Or if anyone else called. Mr Paladin shivered and drew nearer to the glowing bar in the wall which was his fire. Suppose Miss Gay were to call this evening? She had hinted at it after the Choral Society practice on Monday, and the worst of it was that she had an excuse. It was now more than a month since she had borrowed Paradise Lost, and she would surely bring it back this evening when he had the misfortune to be in.

  He turned once more to his letter. ‘I am preaching a course of sermons on God’s Presence,’ he wrote, and then gave a short account of the first one, which had been on the need to approach God in a spirit of Wonder and Awe. ‘I am also continuing my studies in Hebrew, and am finding time to read a little Plato and Homer in the evenings. I was glad of the thicker pyjamas, although I am hoping that the nights will soon be warmer. Now that the cricket season is beginning I expect to be busier than I was in the winter, as the rector is so keen about it and will be playing whenever he can. All my evenings will be taken up with Evensong, Bible Classes for men and boys, and the Lads’ Club, and there will be my sermons to prepare … ’ He produced such a formidable list of activities that when his mother read the letter she was quite alarmed and wrote off to her son at once, giving him strict instructions to have milk or Horlicks before he went to bed.

  As a matter of fact Mr Paladin had not meant to create the impression that he was overworked. He had been thinking, as he wrote, of all the excuses he could legitimately produce for not seeing Miss Gay or going to parties at her house. He had to admit that he had suffered a setback since the glorious victory in the conservatory. After the Choral Society practice he had not been on his guard, for the singing of Haydn’s Creation had been very exhausting, so that he had quite forgotten to avoid Miss Gay after it was over. The worst had happened, and he had found himself in duty bound, as a gentleman and clergyman of the Church of England, to escort her home.

  ‘Now, Mr Paladin, I’m going to admit something,’ she had said, before they were out of earshot of a group of Sunday school teachers.

  ‘Oh, yes?’ He had been polite, interested even, but he had avoided the gaze of her sharp, dark eyes. He expected to hear an admission that she preferred Haydn to Bach, or something else relevant to the evening.

  Instead she edged nearer to him so that she nearly pushed him off the pavement, and said in a simpering voice, ‘You know, I’m really frightened of the dark.’

  ‘Indeed, that is very interesting.’ He tried to raise the tone of the conversation. Instead of adding, ‘You have no need to be afraid now that I am here,’ he said, ‘Now I feel quite different. I agree with the poet Young, “Darkness has more divinity for me,”’ he quoted. ‘Don’t you find that sublime thoughts come most often with the darkness?’ he said quickl
y and desperately. ‘Is it not possible that your fear is a kind of wonder, that necessary awe … ’ Mr Paladin stopped, feeling rather foolish as he realized that Miss Gay had already heard his sermon. Her next remark was not reassuring.

  ‘I shall never have to feel afraid of walking home by myself now that you’ve joined the Choral Society,’ she said, as they reached the gates of Alameda.

  Mr Paladin felt like a prisoner, for she was clinging to his arm and he could not shake her off without being impolite. He had come to the conclusion, regretfully, for he was fond of singing, that he would have to sacrifice those pleasant evenings at the Choral Society. It seemed unfair; all he wanted was to be left alone with his Hebrew, his Plato, and his Homer.

  ‘You and I must talk more about these things,’ she said, letting go of his arm. ‘I’m sure you could do so much to improve my mind. Oh, and I really must return your Paradise Lost, I’ve had it a dreadfully long time.’

  It’s only a three and sixpenny Oxford edition, thought Mr Paladin suddenly. ‘Perhaps you would like to have it?’ he said hopefully.

  ‘Oh, no, thank you, although it’s most kind of you. Do you know, I discovered after I’d borrowed it that we had one all the time?’ she tittered. ‘And now I must go in. I don’t know what my uncle would say if he knew how long you’d kept me out here talking.’

  Mr Paladin could think of nothing to say in reply to this unjust accusation. It did not occur to him until he was nearly home that he could easily have asked her for the book there and then. He might even have been carrying it under his arm at that moment, the last link between him and Miss Gay. He cursed his stupidity as he sat in his lodgings.

  He finished his letter, and then decided that he would meditate on his sermon for a little while. It was half past nine, quite a likely time for Miss Gay to call. Then suddenly he had an idea. If he turned out the light she would come past and see that his room was in darkness, and then she might not ask to see him, but just leave the book and go away. At least it was worth trying. He would turn out the light and the fire too, although it would be cold without it, and he would sit in the corner by the bookcase, so that if Mrs Roberts came into the room to make sure, she would think he was not in.