“He will be here at a quarter past to pick us up,” she said. “He had to talk to a soldier he knows.”
“Seeing a man about a dog, I suppose,” said Dr. Ford, a remark which Mrs. Morland decided not to forgive for some time, though she forgot all about it almost at once, for, like the late Count of Monte Cristo, Tony appeared, lingered for a fraction of a second in the doorway to mark his entrance, came in and shut the door.
“I am sorry I couldn’t come to my mamma’s lecture, Lady Waring,” he said with old-fashioned courtesy. “I met an old friend who needed my advice, so I thought I ought to stay with him.”
Lady Waring, pleased at the attention, for she had almost given up expecting courtesy from the young, called to her husband.
“Harry,” she said, “this is Mrs. Morland’s youngest son. He is on leave.”
“Sir,” said Tony, putting out his hand with a tinge of respectful deference that at once won Sir Harry’s heart, who called him “my boy” and made searching inquiries about various local men in the Barsetshires, most of which Tony was able to answer.
Dr. Ford, a little mortified by Tony’s punctuality, though really pleased for his old friend Mrs. Morland’s sake on the whole, now said they must go at once.
“A splendid lecture, I hear, Mrs. Morland,” said Sir Harry, as he conducted his visitor to the door. “I shall hear all about it from my wife. That is a nice boy of yours; he thinks of his men. This mechanized army is all very fine,” said Sir Harry, who had all the old cavalryman’s proper contempt for modern methods, “but an army still marches on its feet, and if the young officers don’t look after the men’s feet we’ll never get anywhere. Good luck to him.”
“Not that way, Sir Harry,” said Dr. Ford, breaking into what threatened to be a slightly emotional scene. “My car’s in the kitchen yard.”
Sir Harry was shocked. Not that he used the front door much himself, as we already know, but to bring an honoured guest, and a lady who wrote books to boot, by the kitchen passage went against his sense of what was fit.
“Well, good-bye, Mrs. Morland,” he said, conducting his visitor to the other door. “I expect you’ll have us all in a book before long. Good-bye, my boy. You go on looking after your men’s feet and you’ll do all right for them and for yourself.”
Mrs. Morland and Tony followed Dr. Ford down the kitchen passage in silence. Mrs. Morland was trying to forget the remark about putting people in books, a suggestion which always drove her to frenzy and to a strong wish to tell the speaker that no one present was either interesting or funny enough to find their way into a book of hers, and concentrating on Sir Harry’s kind and delightful praise of Tony. That young gentleman was meditating on the ease with which one could make a good impression if one wanted to, though it is to be feared that he did not reflect how fatally easy it is to make a bad impression if one does not want to. In the passage, which was dimly lighted, he nearly bumped into Selina who was coming out of the kitchen.
“Sorry,” said Tony. “Oh, Mrs. Crockett, I’d back Sergeant Hopkins any day. He really understands vegetables. Good-bye, and I’ll come and see you next leave unless I’m killed.”
“Oh, sir!” said Selina and her lovely eyes misted with tears she watched the guests depart.
“Tom Jenks is back,” said a voice.
“Oh, you did upset me, Mr. Margett,” said Selina. “I never heard you come up.”
“No one does,” said Jasper. “Nor the rabbits, nor the pheasants, nor the vermin, nor no one. I saw the ambulance with Tom Jenks. He’s doing nicely, he says, and the nurses at the hospital were as pretty as a picture.”
If Jasper had hoped to provoke Selina to a display of jealousy, he was disappointed. Wiping her eyes she said it was dreadful poor Private Jenks having an operation all over again and she was so glad the nurses were nice.
“Not so pretty as some,” said Jasper. “I’ll take Tom Jenks out shooting as soon as he’s well enough. Give him a shot at a rabbit. That’ll do him more good than all the doctor’s medicine.”
“But don’t let him kill the poor rabbit, Mr. Margett,” Selina pleaded. “It’s dreadful to think of killing a poor little rabbit and Private Jenks is such a kindhearted boy. He drowned all the stable cat’s kittens for Cook except the one she kept and he said they didn’t feel it a bit.”
Jasper gave a long whistle, expressive of his opinion of women, and disappeared into the darkness.
Colonel Winter had not forgotten his promise, or at least the wish he expressed to Leslie Waring, that he would come and hear Mrs. Morland’s talk; nor had Leslie forgotten it. But though he had every intention of coming to tea, listening to the lecture and staying to dinner, he was a soldier. On the morning of that day he was suddenly summoned to London, which meant getting a car at once to Winter Overcotes and spending at least one night in town. There was not time to telephone to Leslie, so he told Corporal Jackson to ring up the Priory and tell Miss Waring that he had been called away and would ring her up as soon as he got back. Corporal Jackson industriously wrote the message down in his notebook, resumed his occupation of discussing Arsenal’s form with Private Moss, and very naturally forgot all about his instructions.
So Leslie, who after telling herself that Philip did not mean what he said, had decided that he would come well before teatime, sit beside her during the talk, and stay to dinner, was hard put to it to behave well. When Philip did not turn up for tea she made up her mind that he had been kept at the camp and would be waiting in the billiard-room. When she looked round the room and could not see him her heart fell into her knees, till imagination coming to the rescue informed her that he was just too late for the lecture, but would be waiting in the hall, or at any rate in the drawing-room when they got back. This position proving untenable, she retreated to the defence that he would ring up before dinner. But these gradations of hope deferred are too familiar to us all. It is enough to say that by dinnertime she was as tired by her own emotions as any sensible young woman can be, and what was more, so feverishly cross that her aunt looked at her once or twice with anxiety and even Noel got bare civility from her. Saying, quite truthfully, that to-morrow was her day in London, she went to bed early, but did not sleep well. After her talk with Philip, the drowsy moments before sleep had been agreeably filled by musings on the perfect school; a building which, without any intention on her part, had a curious resemblance to the Priory. It was rather fun to plan the big rooms as class-rooms, to settle the masters’ quarters, the dining-hall, the headmaster’s private house in the Warings’ present quarters, to decide where the playing-fields would be and to hope that the War Office would leave the fixed basins. All this passed through her busy mind with no reference to actual conditions. Not for a moment did she think of the Priory without her uncle and aunt, nor was she really thinking whether Cecil would care for the plan. But to plan a school without a house for it was unreasonable, so she continued her pleasant, competent dreams.
To-night she had no intention of school-planning. Anyone so thoughtless—one did not wish to say untruthful and untrustworthy—would certainly never be able to concentrate on a school. As for working with or for such a person, the whole idea was fantastic and she was thoroughly ashamed of herself for having entertained it, even in fun. Dismissing Philip Winter from her thoughts, she lay awake till nearly one o’clock, at which hour she fell asleep, disliking him more than ever.
CHAPTER XI
NEXT day Leslie went to town, to work at the office, sleep at her flat, work again next day and come down by the usual afternoon train. Lydia spent a useful morning in the convalescent hospital, helping Nurse Poulter in the wards. Matron had not forgotten Lydia’s wish to do full-time work, but what with a scare of chickenpox and Matron going away for a fortnight nothing had been settled. The chickenpox had turned out, as in the case of Master Peppercorn at Southbridge School, to be a rash; Matron had returned from her holiday, but for several days was inaccessible while she dealt with papers and patients an
d gathered the reins once more into her capable hands. Meanwhile, Lydia had been giving a hand when wanted and otherwise found plenty to do in the garden and in entertaining Mr. Needham, who though grateful to his hostess for her care was glad to escape at times, for the sitting-room, while nominally his room, was used by Nannie as a suitable place in which to pronounce panegyrics on her many ex-charges, always ending with the interesting information that Baby Crawley, for so she called Octavia to the annoyance of that lady’s betrothed, never would eat her greens, with various unpleasant details as to Baby Crawley’s rejection of the same.
So after lunch Lydia went down to the village. The door of No. 1 Ladysmith Cottages being on the jar she went straight into Mr. Needham’s sitting-room and found him smoking a pipe and reading one of Mrs. Morland’s books.
“Hullo, Tommy,” said Lydia. “Come for a walk.”
“I’d love to,” said Mr. Needham. “I was going out this morning to do some shopping but Mrs. Allen wouldn’t let me because it was raining. I think she has just gone out, so we might escape before she comes back. Anyway it’s a lovely afternoon now, so she can’t blame me. If she calls Octavia Baby Crawley once more I shall break off my engagement.”
The conspirators accordingly tiptoed from the silent house, reached the street and paused. Lydia, with good generalship, would have led a reconnoitring party up the side lane, past the shed, and so fetched a circuit round the village, but Mr. Needham said he must get some tobacco.
“All right,” said Lydia. “Don’t say you’ve not been warned.”
In the shop they found Nannie, buying beans for early sowing. Mr. Needham began to back, but it was too late, for Nannie had seen him through the little window.
“Oh, go on in, Tommy,” said Lydia impatiently.
“Oh,” said Mr. Needham nervously, “I didn’t know you were here, Mrs. Allen. I only came in to buy some tobacco.”
“Just as well, sir,” said Nannie. “I meant to ask you where’s that other vest of yours, because I want to wash it. You’re not wearing it, are you? I told you last night, sir, you’d had it on quite long enough.”
Mr. Needham, feeling naked and unprotected before Nannie’s all-seeing eye and the deep interest of Mrs. Hamp, the tailor’s sister-in-law, who sold tobacco, sweets when there were any, small articles of haberdashery, cheap newspapers, seeds and a few home-made buns, said he was most awfully sorry, but he’d dropped it into the bath this morning.
“So I put it flat inside my bath towel to get dry sooner and put the towel on the rail,” said Mr. Needham, adding hurriedly “as neatly as I could,” in the faint hope of placating his hostess.
“That comes of not telling Nannie at once,” said Mrs. Allen. “I saw the towel on the rail, sir, and I thought ‘Well, the gentleman has put his towel tidy for once,’ so I didn’t fold it again. Another time tell me directly, sir.”
Mr. Needham, crimson with abasement, paid for his tobacco and left the shop.
“As nice a gentleman as you’d wish to see, Mrs. Hamp,” said Nannie. “So quiet, and always in punctual to meals. Not like old Mr. Horniman. Marigold’s sister Flo used to work there and she said the old gentleman hadn’t been down punctual to a meal all the time she was there. Always reading his books, he was. Now Mr. Needham likes a nice book; I lent him one of Mrs. Morland’s that Miss Leslie gave me. But at five minutes to one, or twenty-five past seven, away goes the book, or his letter or whatever he’s writing, and the table all ready for me to lay the cloth.”
“He’s in here most days, Mrs. Allen,” said Mrs. Hamp, “for a newspaper, or tobacco, or some little thing and always so cheerful. When you think of his arm, it does seem a shame. It’s much to be wished we had someone like him at the Vicarage. Mr. Horniman never came in here, unless it was an odd time, and never a word to say but get what he wanted and out again. Now your gentleman, Mrs. Allen, it’s a pleasure to serve him.”
Lydia and Mr. Needham continued their progress down the village street. Lydia, in her generous anxiety to forward Mr. Needham’s cause, had meant to introduce him to the more important of her village friends, thereby helping him to win the regard of what she hoped might be his future parishioners, but as they went from the post-office to the chemist’s, from the chemist’s to the china shop, where Mr. Needham insanely hoped to be able to match the tooth-vase which he had knocked off his washing-stand and broken just before lunch, from the china shop to the station to look up the morning trains to Barchester, Lydia found that her old friend was already well known and apparently well liked. Far from feeling disappointed that her work was already done, she was delighted that Mr. Needham was standing so well on his own feet and, being herself, at once wished to share the thought with someone, preferably the nearest person available.
“I say, Tommy,” she said, “you’re even grown-upper than I thought.”
“Not nastily, I hope,” said Mr. Needham anxiously.
“Of course not. Very, very nicely,” said Lydia. “Only I do feel a bit as if everyone was grown up now and I wasn’t.”
“I always thought you were frightfully grown-up,” said Mr. Needham. “You always knew what to do. In fact, if it it hadn’t been for you I don’t think I’d have been brave enough to propose to Octavia. But I don’t suppose anyone feels really grown-up inside.”
“What would you call really grown-up?” asked Lydia.
“Knowing about income tax and things, and being a chairman of committees, oh and all that,” said Mr. Needham vaguely.
Lydia said like the Dean.
Mr. Needham agreed that the Dean probably felt as grown-up as anyone, but he knew for a matter of fact that the Dean was very frightened of his eldest daughter, though fond of her, and would go miles out of his way to avoid old Lady Norton, because she would tell him what he ought to plant in the Deanery garden and send him cuttings which his gardener, who was an enemy of Lady Norton’s gardener, and of whom the Dean was terrified, deliberately allowed to die.
“Well, I suppose no one is really grown-up,” said Lydia with a sigh, “not even the King. I did think I’d get grown-up when I was married, but I feel just the same inside. I say, Tommy, when are you and Octavia going to get married?”
“After Easter, she says,” said her betrothed. “We did think sooner, but the Bishop is broadminded about marriages in Lent, so of course Dr. Crawley wouldn’t hear of it, though he doesn’t really mind a bit. Dr. Crawley didn’t know if he’d marry us or give Octavia away, but Octavia said give her away, so we’re going to ask Mr. Miller to marry us. He was at college with my father.”
Lydia said she thought there was a law about a Dean having to marry his own daughter if it was in his cathedral, to which Mr. Needham, quickly grappling with the slight want of ordered thinking in Lydia’s remark, said he hadn’t ever thought about it, but would inquire. Anyway, he said, Dr. Crawley would know, because he knew everything about his job.
Lydia, struck with a new idea and burning to impart it, said she supposed the reason the Bishops of Barchester were always so horrid was that they were really jealous of the Dean.
“I mean, if I were a Bishop of Barchester,” she said, “and my cathedral belonged to someone else, I’d feel horrid about him.”
Mr. Needham was torn between conflicting loyalties, but the old Adam in him being strongly pro-Deanery, he gracefully yielded to his worse self, and he and Lydia had a delightful talk about the Bishop’s wife, who added to the initial fault of having married the Bishop the serious crime of being a friend of Miss Pettinger and often asking her to tea at the Palace. In such heart-warming converse they walked up the village and round the churchyard. While Mr. Needham was reading with great interest the mysterious lists that live in church porches Sir Harry came up.
“I’m just going to the Vicarage, Mrs. Merton,” he said. “Would you and Mr. Needham care to look over it?”
The invitation was gratefully accepted. Sir Harry led the way through the little gate into the Vicarage garden and unlocked the Vica
rage door.
“Drawing-room this side,” said Sir Harry, throwing open the doors, “dining-room opposite. Hatch into kitchen. Bit of glass outside the drawing-room. Like to see the kitchen? There’s a gas-cooker and a little coal range and a copper in the scullery. It’s heated by gas, but you can use wood if you prefer and if this war goes on we’ll be glad to. Hot pipes up and downstairs when we can have the fuel. Nice little cloak-room. Of course it all looks a bit forlorn now, with all the furniture gone, but I’ll have it put into proper order. And this room old Horniman used as his study. Shelves all round, you see, and a door into the garden to escape visitors. Like to see upstairs?”
Without waiting for an answer he led the way. Mr. Needham was as near envy as his good and simple nature would let him. If only he and Octavia had a vicarage like that, how easy it would be to help other people a bit. Though the floors were bare, the walls marked where pictures or book-cases had been and the kitchen full of rubbish, the sun shone almost warmly into the living-rooms, birds were singing outside, the garden was in excellent condition, and Mr. Needham, who had never had a real home since his parents died about ten years previously, felt his heart warm longingly to this abiding-place. He followed Sir Harry and Lydia upstairs.
“Bedroom, dressing-room, bathroom,” said Sir Harry. “Two other bedrooms with communicating door. Do for guests or children, you know. Other spare bedroom. Linen cupboard here with hot pipes. Housemaid’s sink in this cupboard. We needn’t go up further. Two bedrooms in the roof for the servants if there ever are any again. Fixed basins everywhere, you see. Power-plugs for all the things the ladies want; Hoovers and electric irons and all that sort of thing. Well, shall we go down?”
Growing Up Page 28
