The Penguin Complete Novels of Nancy Mitford

by Nancy Mitford

  ‘Oh, I wish you could have seen the gravediggers’ faces! It was a really beautiful moment. Then we all packed into my car and Rosie’s car and came on here, and we’ve brought the flowers for you and Jane because you are engaged. So suitable, we think,’ and he laid his wreath at Albert’s feet. An enormous card was tied to it, bearing the inscription:

  Sweets to the Sweet. In memory of a noble life.

  R.I.P.

  Lady Prague, who had been drinking in every word of all this, said loudly and angrily, ‘Those are the Bright Young People, no doubt. How very disgusting! Come along, Brenda, I’m going. Can I drop you anywhere, Mowbray?’

  ‘Yes, if you happen to be passing the Marlborough …’

  ‘Oh, darling!’ cried Jasper. ‘Did you hear what she called us? What a name! Bright Young People! Oh, how unkind to suggest that we are bright – horrid word – I see nothing bright about a funeral, anyway, do you? What a nasty old woman! I’m so – so glad she’s gone!

  ‘Now, darling, I must telephone – may I? – to the Daily Runner and tell them all about it: they’ll just have nice time to write it up. We had six photographers and a cinematograph at the graveside, and the light has been very good today, luckily. Would you like to be photographed among the wreaths, darling? It might give quite a good boost to the exhibition.’

  ‘I think not, Jasper, thank you so much. The Press people were here this morning and this is by way of being serious, you know, not a “freak party”,’ said Albert rather crossly. His nerves were on edge, and the mock funeral, which would at any other time have amused him a lot, struck him as being a painfully stupid idea.

  He was thankful when they all dashed away to hear the Will read at Jasper’s house, leaving the wreaths piled up underneath The Absinthe Drinker, especially as Jane’s father and mother came in a moment later.

  The Dacres, of course, thought Albert’s pictures perfectly raving mad, although they were too polite to say so. They had come with every intention of buying one, but decided in whispers that they were too dreadful – even for a lavatory, so they ordered copies of ‘Recent Finds at Dalloch Castle’ instead. While they were doing this, they noticed that Mrs Fairfax had arrived, and Lady Dacre, remarking that she refused to shake hands with that woman, left the Gallery, taking Sir Hubert in tow.

  ‘My dear!’ said Mrs Fairfax to Albert, ‘I had to come round for a moment to support you, but I am most frightfully busy. Have you heard the news? Well, I’m going to marry Cosmo again, which is lovely, because I do enjoy being a duchess when all’s said and done, and now, with any luck, I shall be one for the rest of my life. You can’t think what a difference it makes in shops and trains. Aren’t your pictures divine? Especially the one of Florence in tweed.

  ‘Ralph and I were furious to miss the fire, but it was lucky I went to Gleneagles, because that’s where I met Cosmo again – in the swimming-bath – and we got on so well comparing notes about our various husbands and wives that we fixed it up there and then; so I must fly now and get on with my trousseau. If I have another baby, what relation will it be to Bellingham? Good-bye, darling, then. I really have to go.’

  Isaac Manuel, the art critic and collector, now put in an appearance, and Albert spent nearly an hour going round the pictures with him. He was greatly soothed and comforted by the older man’s intelligent appreciation of his work.

  ‘You are very young,’ he said to Albert as he was leaving, ‘and your style is often crude and bombastic, but all the same, Mr Gates, I must admit that I am very favourably impressed. I have not enjoyed an afternoon so much for some time. I predict a future for you if you realize, as I can see you do, that these methods are, in themselves, far from satisfactory and only a means to an end. Keep the end always in view and you may become a very good artist indeed. I shall certainly see that you have an excellent notice in my paper, and shall most probably present one of your pictures to the Nation. Good day.’

  When Albert returned to the Gallery from seeing Mr Manuel into the street, he found that everyone had gone except Jane, Sally, Walter and the admiral who appeared to have fallen asleep among the funeral wreaths, a terrifying sight as his glass eye remained open, fixed upon the ceiling in a fearful stare.

  ‘What do you think that horrid old admiral has done?’ cried Jane. ‘To start with he drank so many cocktails that there weren’t nearly enough to go round, and then when they were finished he got a straw from one of the wreaths and drank all the absinthe out of the glass in your picture. Sally actually saw him do it.’

  ‘No, really that’s too much,’ said Albert, who couldn’t help laughing all the same. ‘I suppose in future I shall be obliged to fill that glass with coloured water, otherwise people will make a habit of drinking it, and you can see for yourselves how terribly the colour values are disturbed when the glass is empty.’

  ‘Well, my dear Albert, I congratulate you,’ said Walter warmly. ‘The whole thing was a great success, a really good party. And everyone thought the pictures quite brilliant. Manuel was very much impressed. I heard him tell Mr Buggins that he intends to buy one for his collection, and most probably one for the Nation.’

  ‘Clever Albert,’ said Jane. ‘Darling, I’m so pleased, aren’t you? What’s the time, by the way?’

  ‘Past seven. We’d better go, I think. No one’s likely to come now, and we’ll have to be rather quick if we’re really dining at eight.’

  They picked up their bags, hats and other belongings and began to move towards the door, when Walter said:

  ‘Look here! What about the admiral? He seems to have passed out completely among those lilies. We can’t very well leave him like that, can we?’

  Albert considered.

  ‘No, I suppose we can’t. Hadn’t we better put him into a taxi and send him home? I expect we could carry him between us, Walter; or if he’s too heavy I’ll call the commissionaire to help.’

  They advanced upon the admiral, Walter taking his shoulders and Albert his legs, and half-carried, half-dragged him to the street. Jane hailed a taxi into which they bundled him and shut the door.

  ‘Where to, sir?’

  ‘Oh! Walter, where does he live?’

  ‘How should I know? I haven’t an idea.’

  ‘Well, where shall we send him?’

  Silence.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ said Walter. ‘Isn’t there a special place somewhere for admirals? Now what is it called? Oh, yes! I remember, of course.’

  He gave the taxi-driver half-a-crown and said:

  ‘Take this gentleman to the Admiralty, please.’

  21

  The front page of next morning’s Daily Runner was full of interest to members of the recent house party at Dalloch Castle. Jane read it, as she always did, while breakfasting in bed; and for once in her life she pored over its columns with absolutely breathless attention, reading every word, instead of merely skimming down the more sensational columns and then turning over to see if she was mentioned in the gossip page, which I regret to say was her usual method.

  Today, the first paragraph which met her eye was:

  AGED PEER DIES IN HARNESS

  LORD PRAGUE LIFELESS IN

  UPPER HOUSE

  NIGHT WATCHMAN’S STORY

  We regret to announce that Lord Prague, G.C.B., C.V.O., etc., was found dead late last night in the House of Lords. It is stated that his body was discovered just before midnight by Mr George Wilson, the night watchman.

  Mr Wilson, when interviewed by the Daily Runner, said:

  ‘I always go into the House at least once during the night to clear up any pieces of paper, orange peel, or empty bottles that happen to have been left underneath the seats. I had been tidying for some time last night when I noticed the figure of a man half-lying on one of the benches. This did not really surprise me, as the peers often sleep on late into the night after a debate. So I went up to hi
m and said: “Twelve o’clock, m’lord. Can I get you a cup of tea?” He took no notice and, thinking he was fast asleep, I was going to let him stay there till morning when something in his attitude made me pause and look at him more closely. I then realized that he was stone dead, so I went and fetched a policeman.’

  Mr Wilson was much shaken by his experience and says that although he has often known the peers to die in the corridors and refreshment rooms of the House he cannot recall one to have died in the House itself before.

  Dr McGregor, who was called in by the police, said that death, which was due to heart failure, had taken place some six or seven hours previously: therefore Lord Prague must have passed away in the middle of the debate on Subsidized Potatoes (which is reported on page 13).

  It was stated at an early hour this morning that Lady Prague is utterly prostrated with grief.

  Lord Rainford, a cousin of the late peer, said in an interview:

  ‘I saw Prague for a moment yesterday afternoon, and he seemed in his usual good form. It has been a terrible shock to all of us, and the loss to the Nation will be irreparable.’

  DASHING MORE

  Absalom More, fourth Baron Prague, was born in 1838. Educated at Eton and Sandhurst, he first distinguished himself as a boy of eighteen in the Crimea, where he earned the soubriquet of Dashing More – true to his family motto, More to the Fore. When peace had been declared he was warmly applauded by Queen Victoria, with whom he was always a great favourite. In 1859 he succeeded to the title on the death of his father, and in 1860 he married one of the Queen’s Ladies-in-Waiting, Lady Anastasia Dalloch, daughter of the Earl of Craigdalloch, who died in 1909. In 1910 he married as his second wife, Florence, daughter of Mr Leonard Jackson of Dombey Hall, Leicestershire, who survives him. Both marriages are childless, and the peerage devolves upon a distant cousin, Mr Ivanhoe More, of Victoria Road, Kensington.

  The very deepest sympathy will go out to Lady Prague, but her sorrow must needs be tempered by the thought that Dashing More died as he would have wished to die – in harness.

  (PICTURE ON THE BACK PAGE.)

  Jane was entranced by this piece of news and read the paragraph over and over again. She was just about to turn to the back page for the promised picture when her eye was caught by:

  THE ‘BRIGHT YOUNG PEOPLE’ GO TOO FAR

  MOCK FUNERAL IN LONDON NECROPOLIS

  NOT FUNNY – General Murgatroyd.

  It is felt that the Bright Young People have had their day and that their jokes, often in the worst possible taste, should come to an end. Yesterday afternoon a ‘Mock Funeral’ was held in the London Necropolis at Brookwood, where a site had been purchased in the name of Mrs Bogus Bottom to hold the remains of Bogus Bottom, Esq. The funeral cortège, including six carriages full of weeping ‘mourners’, travelled for several miles through the London streets, often causing the traffic to be delayed while it passed, and finally boarded the special Necropolis train. At Brookwood the coffin was reverently conveyed to the graveside and was just going to be lowered carefully into the grave, when the lid opened, and Mr Julius Raynor stepped out of it, dressed as for tennis. The ‘mourners’ then picked up the wreaths, which were numerous and costly, and fled to waiting motor cars.

  (PICTURES ON THE BACK PAGE.)

  HEARTLESS

  The Daily Runner, feeling that the only way to stop these heartless pranks is by means of public opinion, sent an interviewer to the following representative men and women, who have not scrupled to express their disapproval:

  Miss Martha Measles (well-known novelist):

  ‘I have never heard that it is either clever or amusing to jest with Death …’

  Sir Holden Crane (sociologist):

  ‘If these young people would bear more children, they would hardly have the time for such foolishness …’

  Bishop of Burford:

  ‘I think it most shameful, especially as I hear that many people doffed their hats to the cortège as it passed through London …’

  Mr Southey Roberts (satirist):

  ‘Are these people either “Bright” or “Young”? …’

  General Murgatroyd:

  ‘It’s a damned nuisance, and not funny …’

  It is understood that the authorities at Brookwood are taking action, and they are very anxious to know the address of Mrs Bogus Bottom.

  Jane now turned to the back page and was rewarded by a photograph of Lord Prague in youth; and one of Julius Raynor, a ghastly figure dressed entirely in white, leaping from his coffin.

  She then casually glanced at the middle page, where her attention was rooted by a photograph of Albert and a paragraph headed:

  AMAZING FEAT OF YOUNG ARTIST

  CRITICS ASTOUNDED BY NEW GENIUS PICTURE FOR THE NATION?

  Mr Albert Gates (herewith) has astounded the art critics and half social London with his exhibition of amazing pictures (now on view at the Chelsea Galleries). They are composed in many cases round real objects stuck to the canvas, such as, for instance, eye-glasses, buttons, hats, and even surgical limbs; and are of a brilliance and novelty impossible to describe, particularly No. 15., The Absinthe Drinker, which it is rumoured, has been bought for the Nation by Mr Isaac Manuel. Another interesting picture is entitled: Impression of Lady P— and is executed entirely in bits of tweed cut into small squares. This is framed in beige mackintosh.

  Mr Gates, who left Oxford four years ago, and has since been studying art in Paris, is a tall, good-looking young man of a modest disposition. When a Daily Runner representative called on him after the private view of his pictures yesterday, he seemed unaware of the sensation his work has caused in art circles. ‘I think it was quite a good party,’ he said, referring to the private view.

  Mr Gates recently became engaged to Miss Jane Dacre, the beautiful daughter of Sir Hubert and Lady Dacre of Stow-on-the-Wold, Gloucestershire.

  Jane, on reading this, became very thoughtful. She was not at all sure that she liked this sudden blaze of fame which had come so unexpectedly upon Albert. The picture which she had framed in her mind of their married life had been imagined without this new factor. She had thought of herself as being all in all to him: his one real friend, sticking to him through thick and thin, encouraging, praising and helping. Much as she admired, or thought she admired, Albert’s work herself, it had never occurred to her that he might have a real success with the critics; she had imagined that such revolutionary ideas would remain unnoticed for years, except by a few of the ultramoderns.

  The telephone-bell interrupted her train of thought. She put out her hand rather absentmindedly to take off the receiver, wondering who it could be so early. Albert’s voice, trembling with excitement, said:

  ‘Have you seen the papers, darling? Yes, they’re all the same. Buggins says he can’t remember any exhibition to have had such notices for years and years. And I’ve just been talking to Isaac Manuel. He’s buying The Absinthe Drinker for the Tate, my dear! and two still-lifes for himself; and he’s commissioned me to fresco some rooms in his new house. What d’you think of that? So it looks as if we shall have to live in London for a bit, after all. Do you mind, darling one? Of course, I said I could do nothing until our honeymoon is over, but we may have to cut it short by a week or two, I dare say. Isn’t it splendid, darling? Aren’t you pleased? I never for a moment thought the English critics had so much sense, did you? Where are you lunching today? Oh, yes, I’d forgotten. Well, meet me at the Chelsea, will you, at about one? You’re not feeling ill or anything, are you? Oh, I thought you sounded rather subdued, that’s all. Well, good-bye. I must go round to Manuel’s now.’

  As Jane hung up the receiver her eyes were full of tears.

  ‘I couldn’t feel more jealous,’ she thought miserably, ‘if it were another woman. It’s disgusting of me not to be pleased, but I can’t help it.’

 
She began working herself up into a state of hysteria while she dressed. She saw all her dreams of Albert’s struggle for fame, with herself helping and encouraging, of a tiny house in Paris only visited by a few loyal friends, and of final success in about ten years’ time largely brought about by her own influence, falling to earth shattered.

  Albert, with his looks, talents and new-found fame, would soon, she thought, become the centre of that semi-artistic social set which is so much to the fore in London. He would be courted and flattered, his opinions accepted, and his presence eagerly sought after: while she, instead of being his one real friend, the guiding star of his life, would become its rather dreary background. She imagined herself growing daily uglier and more boring. People would say: ‘Yes, poor boy, he married her before he had met any other women. He must be regretting it now that it’s too late.’

  Jane, who at all times was inclined to take an exaggerated view of things, and whose nerves had been very much on edge since the fire in Scotland, was now incapable of thinking calmly or she would have realized that a few press notices, however favourable, and a commission from Sir Isaac Manuel, although very flattering to a young artist, do not in themselves constitute fame. She had a sort of wild vision of Albert as the pivot of public attention, already too busy being flattered and adulated to speak to her for more than a minute on the telephone. She imagined herself arriving at the Chelsea Galleries for their luncheon appointment and finding that he had forgotten all about her and gone off with some art critic and his wife instead.

  At last Jane believed that all these things were quite true, and by the time she had finished dressing she was in a furious rage with Albert. Unable to contain herself, she wrote to him:

  Darling Albert,

  I have been thinking about you and me, and I can see now that we should never be happy together. You have your work, and now this tremendous success has come you won’t be wanting me as well, and I think it better from every point of view to break off our engagement, so good-bye, darling Albert, and please don’t try to see me any more as I couldn’t bear it.