I Ordered a Table for Six

by Noel Streatfeild

  “I shouldn’t fuss about Mrs. Framley; she’s all right.”

  Amongst the many things about Gerda which annoyed Letty was the variety of noises she could produce, none of which could be found fault with in itself, but all of which sounded as if it might translate into “Don’t talk nonsense to me.” Gerda made one of these noises now, and helped it out by darting Letty a look which was full of pity for imbeciles.

  “She does not sleep, even with her sleeping tablets—two taken each night. I know, for I count the bottle, and, having taken them, she still has read almost a book before morning. Do I not go to The Times Library to change the books, and do I not know what time she begins to read it, and where the marker is in the morning? She is looking ill. It is easier for me to see than for you, for I see her without her make-up. One night I go to the bathroom—it is two in the morning—and as I pass her door I hear her walking, up and down, up and down. So!” Gerda gave a dramatic imitation of how she imagined Adela, in an acutely nervous state, had walked.

  Letty disliked Gerda’s imitation; there was no need, she thought, for all that. It was quite sufficiently clear that she had heard Adela walking about, without that foreign showing off. Gerda’s story linked up with an impression of her own that Adela was getting into a state about Paul coming out of prison, but, as far as she knew, Gerda knew nothing of Paul and she was not going to be the one to tell her.

  “She’s a bit worked up over Mr. Penrose coming. It’s only natural. After all, he is the supporter of ‘Comforts for the Bombed.’”

  Gerda made another noise, different, but even more clear in its intention, and, as if to suggest that she had no more time to waste on fools, began unbuttoning Letty’s frock.

  There was a knock on the door and Gills’s voice outside.

  “Is Miss Smithson with you, Gerda?” Letty opened the door. “Oh, Miss Smithson, Mr. Penrose is here. He says he’s come to see the workrooms.”

  Letty and Gills stared at each other. “Comforts for the Bombed” had known difficult moments, and together they had rounded them, but they had never faced such a situation as this.

  “He can’t see them.” Letty’s voice was determined. “They’re being cleaned, or anything you like, but he’s not going to see them while Mrs. Framley’s out.”

  “I suppose,” Gills suggested, “we couldn’t telephone her to come home?”

  “Not a hope. She’s at that big meeting of the voluntary organizations. I don’t know the telephone number and, if I did, no one would find her.”

  “Where shall I put him? As he said the work-rooms I had to leave him downstairs, and he’s lifting all the dust-sheets and looking under them.”

  Letty beckoned to Gerda.

  “Undo the rest of me. Bring him up to Mrs. Framley’s sitting-room, Gills, and don’t let him argue.”

  Letty, while changing back into her dress, had worked herself up into such a state over Gardiner’s proposed inspection that she dashed into Adela’s sitting-room prepared to battle to the death with a perfect gorilla of a man. Gardiner, when she saw him, caught her up in the same way that a cold drink would had she expected a hot one. He was miles from being a gorilla: a little man with grey hair, a lined face beaming love of the world through horn-rimmed spectacles. He held out his hand.

  “I am Gardiner Penrose; and you are Miss Smithson. Why, Miss Smithson, I feel we are already acquainted—all those long reports you’ve typed and sent to me and signed ‘Letty Smithson.’ I surely am sorry if I’ve come at an awkward time, but I finished what I was on just half an hour before schedule, and I thought maybe this would be a good chance to look over this little concern of Mrs. Framley’s. My secretary tells me that we are meeting here at 7.30 to-morrow for a cocktail before Mrs. Framley’s little supper party, and I figured she might be planning to show me how everything’s working then; but I just hate to be hustled, so as I had half an hour now I thought I’d come in right away.”

  Letty liked the look of Gardiner, and it was no good beating about the bush. She pulled forward a chair.

  “Shall we sit down?” She waited for him to sit and then said earnestly: “Of course I know it’s your charity and you can do what you like, Mr. Penrose, but honestly you can’t see round to-night and think that’ll do, because it won’t. Ever since you started the charity you’ve been awfully important to the workers. You know Mrs. Framley has had to decide things for you rather, and when she needed a clear line about anything she’s had to say: ‘Mr. Penrose would like this done or that done.’” She saw the corners of his mouth twitch. “Oh, please don’t think it’s funny, because it’s important to us. The workers all think of you as our Mr. Penrose, and they expect to see you as you’re over here.”

  “I wasn’t laughing, Miss Smithson; it was just the way you said I’d been built up. It reminded me of way back when I was a child and my mother used to build up Satan. She was a very powerful believer in Satan and it grew so that she could speak for him, and did she get me scared!”

  Letty grinned at him.

  “You’ve had a lovely build-up, as you call it. Since ‘Comforts for the Bombed’ started you’ve been a kind of cross between God and the governor of the Bank of England.”

  He laughed, an eager, infectious laugh, much younger than his lines and grey hair.

  “God, I suppose, as being invisible and just making His wishes known, and the bank keeping an eye on the financial side. You know, Miss Smithson, I should think I had better never meet your workers. I might be a big disappointment.”

  His laugh had put Letty utterly at ease.

  “I’m sorry, but you’ve got to meet them. Your secretary has fixed it should be Monday; I know you haven’t approved Monday’s schedule, but when he shows it to you you’ll see everything’s fixed. You’re coming here at half-past ten, seeing right over the workrooms and the packing and going through the books, and then you’re driving with Mrs. Framley in one of our worker’s cars to see the other end: the places where our things are stored, and the distribution arrangements, and I’ve planned for you to meet one or two people who have been bombed but and are wearing our clothes. You’ll find it all very interesting.”

  He looked at her with his eyes, behind his glasses, wrinkling with amusement.

  “I’m sure of that. Very well, Miss Smithson, I have my orders and I’ll be here Monday, right on the time you say.” Letty was going to make a semblance of an apology for impertinence, but Gardiner interrupted her. “Now don’t pretend you are sorry for ordering me about, for I can see you are a young woman who intends to get her own way.” He linked his fingers together and gazed at them thoughtfully, as if they could help him to find the right words. When he spoke his voice had changed, it had lost its amused, bantering note. “Miss Smithson, I’ve always reckoned that a smart secretary knew more about the working of a business with which she was concerned than most anybody, and I would be glad of your opinion on a point which has been worrying me since I came over. Do you think this little organization, and others such, are a good plan? Shouldn’t they be merged in the other great organizations?”

  Letty struggled to make her face a blank. It was difficult, for it was most peculiar to hear someone else voicing the exact question she had so often put to herself. To give time for thought, she said:

  “It’s helped a great many people, you know.”

  “Don’t misunderstand me, these poor bombed folk need all the help every one of us can give, but I’ve seen that there are pretty considerable organizations working to handle these things. I’ve been round the boroughs, and to the Town Halls, and I’ve seen the arrangements for re-clothing the people both through your own Lord Mayor’s Fund, and through the American Red Cross handled by the Women’s Voluntary Services. Now, are outside organizations wanted? Do they help or hinder the main effort? Do they lead to overlapping? Back home these working-parties seemed just one of the little ways one co
uld help; but now I’m not sure. What do you say?”

  Letty stared at a picture over Gardiner’s head. It was a Framley picture, one of the few out of those left to Adela by her husband that she had not relegated to a boxroom. It was not good, but it was an effective flower-painting, dim mauve poppies, and tight, button-shaped daisies, and some solid peonies, standing in a green vase against a brown background. Letty had seen the picture countless times, but now, needing something on which to focus, and wishing to avoid Gardiner’s eyes, she found herself seeing it clearly for the first time. She saw shadowy flowers at the back of the vase that she had never noticed before, dahlias she thought. Simultaneously with her consideration of the picture she turned over Gardiner’s question. Her brain had leapt to the two sides of the argument. Adela, her need for occupation, and her especial need with April drawing nearer. On the other, the war and her view, which must be the view of all sane people, that small individual efforts, though helpful now and again, had more of a nuisance value than any other. She lowered her eyes and looked Gardiner in the face.

  “You paid me the compliment of saying I was a smart secretary. I had my first job when I was seventeen and I’ve worked ever since, so I’ve learned a bit, for I’m twenty-four now. Except for my first job I’ve lived in the house with the person who employed me, and if there’s one thing I have learnt, and as far as I could I’ve stuck to, it’s been that a decent secretary has got to put her employer’s affairs first all the time. That’s what makes your question difficult to answer. If you take ‘Comforts for the Bombed’ simply as a war charity, I know you’re right, and it would be better if the whole thing was handed over to the American Red Cross, your end and to the W.V.S. here; but there is Mrs. Framley to consider. The charity fills her life, and she’s worked like a black for it.” She flushed; “You’ve put me in a very awkward position asking me such a question; even saying what I have you’ve made me feel disloyal.”

  “I quite appreciate that, but anything concerning the running of this war, even a little thing like this, is, I guess, beyond such points as to whether you or I feel awkward answering a question. What I think you want to say, Miss Smithson, is that from the point of view of its utility the work here would be better co-ordinated with other work; but from the point of view of Mrs. Framley you think it should be allowed to go on.”

  “That’s it exactly. Anyway could you leave making up your mind about it until you’ve seen all we do on Monday? Perhaps we could think out a compromise. I mean all the finished things could go to the Town Halls in the blitzed towns and areas, instead of to odd charities. If you withdraw your money and gifts I think we should have to close absolutely. We are allowed certain concessions because it’s an American charity. I mean Mrs. Framley couldn’t carry on alone, and it would be an awful blow to her to shut down.”

  “I’d be glad if you could think out a compromise where we could fit into the general scheme and yet leave Mrs. Framley in charge; Mrs. Penrose would never forgive me if I made things harder for her.”

  Letty shot her eyes back to the picture. Now what on earth did that last sentence mean? She had always looked upon Millicent Penrose as queer, partly because she was a great friend of Adela’s, which seemed to be a queer thing to be, and partly because she apparently swallowed wholesale the fairy tales about Adela’s children, which, to Letty, never even began to read like truth; but now a new possibility dawned. Was it possible that Millicent Penrose was not a foolish friend, that she never had swallowed Adela’s tales, and even that a lot of her friendship was based on sympathy? Millicent had seen Paul, she too was a mother, had she always guessed things were not quite as good as Adela made out? Of course the expression ‘harder for her’ might refer purely to living in the war, which was hard enough in all conscience, but somehow Letty did not believe it did; Gardiner had spoken it purposefully, as if he either intended to convey something or to find out how much she knew. There was one of those pauses when two people avoid being the first to speak for fear of telling the other something they do not know. Gardiner gave in; it was clear he was going to get nothing out of Letty. He got up and, walking to the door, spoke of Andrew Bishop. It was kind, he said, of Mrs. Framley to let him bring him to her party.

  Letty relaxed, she was off the awkward question of the utility of “Comforts for the Bombed,” and had done her duty in arranging that Gardiner should carry out a proper inspection on Monday. She had taken to Gardiner, and felt easy with him.

  “It’ll be very nice for Meggie. It’s her first grown-up party and she’ll want someone to dance with.”

  Gardiner paused to calculate.

  “Mrs. Penrose told me Meggie was close on seventeen; Andrew will be older than that, twenty I guess. I’ve never met him, but his grandfather was connected with us in business, and he sent his son, Mr. George Bishop, this boy’s father, over to us for a year to study the way we worked our end. Of course that’s way back, but later Mr. George Bishop married and had a family, two boys, Michael and Andrew, and a girl, Ruth. Michael was many years the eldest, a brilliant boy, he joined the business when he left Oxford, and it was all set that he should come to us for part of a vacation, but in the meantime he went out to India, and was killed in an accident. That was a terrible thing, for it seemed, in spite of the other children, that Michael was just everything to his mother and father.”

  “Is Mr. Andrew Bishop in the business now? I mean, when there isn’t a war.”

  “He was to have been. He, too, was set to pay us a visit, and then this war came. Mr. George Bishop wanted me to go to their place to visit, but though he works in Liverpool his place is way out in the country, and I’m only over two or three weeks, so I couldn’t make it fit with my schedule. I was kind of worried when Mr. Bishop wrote he was sending Andrew to see me. The boy won’t get that much leave that he wants to waste a day visiting a man older than his father, and I was real pleased when my secretary told me how the evening was fixed.”

  “That’s nice,” said Letty, gently urging Gardiner towards the stairs. As he was coming for his inspection on Monday, it was better, she thought, that he should not run into Adela. Adela was sure to be tired after the committee, and would not want him wished on her unexpectedly.

  “Shall I see you to-morrow night, Miss Smithson?”

  “You might, and you mightn’t. Mrs. Hill, Mrs. Framley’s niece by marriage, has been asked, but she does a lot of night-work and she’s not sure if she can get off, and if she doesn’t I’m to go in her place.”

  They were half-way down the stairs. Gardiner gave her a kind smile.

  “We must hope Mrs. Hill does not get the night off.”

  Letty, in spite of Gardiner having been for so long such an important figure in her life, could not, now she had met him, feel in awe of him. Gardiner was not so much not class-conscious as unaware that amongst white people there could be distinctions of class. Letty, living poised between Adela and the servants, found this attitude very pleasant. Of late, owing to her being treated as an equal by most of the workers, she had felt she needed to keep a guard on herself, or she would become natural, and forget, even in front of Mrs. Framley, to speak like a pattern secretary. But now with Gardiner she felt so at home that she let herself go, just as she would if she were talking to Jim.

  “Oh, no, we mustn’t. Mrs. Hill doesn’t get nearly enough relaxation, and she needs it to take her mind off things; her husband was killed at Dunkirk.”

  Gardiner’s face was distressed.

  “Poor thing!”

  “Yes, it was awfully sad. He was an artist. I only saw them together twice, but you couldn’t help feeling how awfully happy they were together.”

  “Has she children?”

  “No, there’s just her. Her parents are alive but they live in the country.” They were passing the passage window. Letty looked out: “I think it’s raining, shall Gills try and get you a taxi?”

  “T
hat would be kind. I have a little rheumatism now and again, and I promised Mrs. Penrose I would try not to get wet. Mrs. Penrose is very fond of England, but she has no opinion at all of your climate. If you could see the rubbers, and the raincoats she packed for me, you would have thought I was preparing to swim here.”

  They had reached the hall. Gills was hovering anxiously; his face expressed nothing at Letty’s request for a taxi, but his movements were just so much quicker than usual that Letty could sense his pleasure that Gardiner was going, and his eagerness to do his share to get him away before Adela returned. Letty, watching Gills with her eyes, had her mind on the Penroses. Gardiner’s talk of rubbers and raincoats, was drawing for her an entirely new picture of them. A Millicent packing, and fussing over her husband, just as her own mother fussed over Dad on a wet morning, was ludicrously unlike her idea of how rich Americans lived. While typing the endless letters to Millicent she had imagined them being delivered at the sort of house she saw on the pictures, which appeared to be built much on the scale of Buckingham Palace. Rich American elderly women, Letty had supposed, her ideas again built on films, sat around all day, beautifully clothed, with superlatively dressed hair, and said smart and amusing things, but they never were homelike, in the way that nice, rich English women like Lady Falls were.

  “It must be worrying for Mrs. Penrose your being here with the air raids.”

  “It certainly is. I made things as easy for her as I could. She has got my daughters with her, and their youngest children, and if there is one thing that could keep Mrs. Penrose from worrying, it is having the grand-children around.”

  Letty, her picture of Millicent changing more and more rapidly, and, as it changed, her surprise growing that the Millicent whom Gardiner was describing could be a friend of Adela’s, said: “Children are a great help.”