On the Friday before Bank Holiday, Noel Merton, now definitely established as a friend of the house, came down, and was at once annexed by Lydia, who wanted to bathe. As Kate was out with her mother, Noel was perfectly ready to accompany Lydia, so long as he wasn’t expected to bathe himself.
‘All right,’ said Lydia. ‘You row the boat and I’ll practise diving. There aren’t many places where it’s safe, but I know a good one, just below the Rectory.’
Accordingly Noel sculled up in a leisurely way to the diving pool, where Lydia practised her diving, taking off each time with a violence that made Noel afraid the boat would capsize. Old Bunce the ferryman came and stared at Lydia long and unwinkingly, after which he went back to his cottage and told his wife and three daughters that Miss Lydia was no better than the Babylonish woman, and if he caught any of them in such goings-on he’d give them the stick. As the Bunce family were all celebrated for never taking off any of their clothes by day or by night, the warning was quite unnecessary. Mrs Bunce said, ‘Don’t be an old fool, Bunce,’ and his daughters giggled and said Father was a one, so old Bunce went back to the river. But Lydia and Noel were on their way home, Lydia wrapped in a new bath-robe which she had taken from Colin’s room without asking. On their way they passed a punt, on which Rose and Philip were seated side by side, gently paddling.
‘Oh, Mr Merton,’ said Rose, ‘how marvellous to see you. Do come to tea tomorrow.’
‘Thank you so much,’ said Noel, ‘but I am staying with Mrs Keith and don’t know what her plans are. How are you, Winter?’
‘How sickening,’ said Rose, ‘but you must come. Have you been bathing?’ she added, looking coldly at Lydia, but somehow not directly addressing her. ‘How ghastly!’
Lydia made no answer. Throwing off the bath-robe she dived from the boat straight under the punt, swam round it with a vigorous over-arm stroke, turned over on her back and raised a small mill-race with her legs, threw up her arms, screamed, sank and reappeared at the other side of the boat.
‘That’s the stuff to give ’em,’ she said, as she scrambled on board and wrapped herself up again. ‘Go on, Noel. Can you imagine anyone being dotty enough to like a girl like that Rose Birkett?’
‘I can imagine it because I’ve seen it,’ said Noel, hoping that his sculling had been strong enough to get them out of earshot of the punt, ‘but heaven defend me from seeing more of her than civility demands.’
‘She’s a blight,’ said Lydia. ‘I say, what do you think about marriage?’
‘Personally or in the abstract?’ asked Noel, as he tied up in the boat-house and pulled Lydia out of the boat.
‘Oh, any way. I mean, when you look at those two it puts you off the whole idea, at least it does me, and I wondered what you thought. Come on, we’ll be late for tea.’
‘I think my feeling about it is,’ said Noel, following her towards the house, ‘that it is a very good thing for the right people, but not for everyone. I don’t think of it for myself. Unless something very romantic happens to me, which I don’t much want or expect, I shall be a kind of permanent uncle to everyone.’
‘Quite right,’ said Lydia approvingly. ‘I expect I’ll get married some day myself, because I’d feel an awful fool if I didn’t, like Miss Pettinger, and Kate ought to get married, of course. I don’t know about Colin, but I rather think he’s an uncle, like you. I bet anything Rose won’t marry Mr Winter. She’d never marry a person that looks unhappy when she speaks to anyone.’
‘How did you think of all this?’ asked Noel, amused.
‘I didn’t. You don’t need to think about things like that. One just knows them. I am sorry for Geraldine Birkett, having a sister like Rose. Now Kate is a nice sort of sister. She may want to tidy one up a bit, but she’s an angel about darning stockings and being decent if one’s upset about anything. Who do you think she’ll marry?’
Noel said he couldn’t imagine, but hoped it would be someone very nice. Like Mr Carter, Lydia said. Yes, someone like Mr Carter would be splendid, Noel said, and then changed the subject, feeling that Lydia was alarmingly near the mark, for in his quality of universal uncle Everard’s absorption in Kate had not passed unnoticed by him. They found that Mrs Keith and Kate had returned and were having tea in the library. Lydia went to change, and Noel talked to his hostesses. Then Colin came down.
‘Hullo, Noel,’ he said. ‘I’m so glad you’ve come. I can’t tell you how nice it is to be surrounded by human faces instead of thousands of boys.’
‘Wasn’t the experiment a success, then?’ asked Noel.
‘Oh, I liked the school very much and the staff were all right, but I never got used to the boys.’
‘How can you say that, Colin,’ said Lydia indignantly, as she came in, ‘when Tony and Eric and Hack are coming tomorrow!’
‘Sorry, Lydia. Those particular boys are almost human,’ said Colin, ‘at least Tony and Eric are. They are both more intelligent than I am in many ways, and you can meet Hacker, at any age from twenty-five to eighty, in almost every common-room in Oxford, I regret to say. But on the whole I’m glad to be free. I wish I were coming to you sooner, Noel. I’m reading like anything now.’
‘Why don’t you come abroad with me for a fortnight?’ said Noel. ‘I want to go to Austria, and I haven’t made any plans. You must be rolling in money with your term’s salary.’
‘I wish I could,’ said Colin longingly. ‘Let’s talk about it sometime,’ he added, looking meaningly at his mother.
But Mrs Keith had heard, and wished to warn them against going to a certain hotel in Rome where one of her aunts had once been very ill owing to drinking unboiled water in August. As this had happened in 1887, and she could not remember the name of the hotel, no one could contradict her. Also, she said, did Colin remember that the Northbridge Flower Show was on the fourteenth, and she did hope he wasn’t going to miss it. Lydia, stretching out a leg to hook a small table with cakes on it, distracted her mother’s attention, who said that once for all Lydia must wear stockings in the house. Before this subject was fully thrashed out, Edith Keith with her two children came in, and Mrs Keith forgot Lydia in her grandmotherly joy. Henry and Catherine, aged respectively five and under two, were agreeable, well-behaved children, and were almost immediately whisked away by their nurse.
‘You know Mr Merton, of course, Edith,’ said Mrs Keith. ‘We shall only be a small party for the weekend. Ourselves, Mr Merton, and Colin’s friend Mr Carter, and three boys in the Twickers’ cottage. But the Birketts will be at the Rectory, and the young man who is engaged to that pretty elder daughter of theirs, so I expect you’ll get some good tennis. I asked them all over here to tea on Sunday, when Miss Pettinger is coming. The raspberries will be ready.’
Lydia remarked sotto voce that the raspberry was what Miss Pettinger needed, was told by her mother to speak distinctly, and, overturning her chair as she got up, went out into the garden.
‘Well, I’ve got something to cheer you up, Mater,’ said Edith, who was the only one of the family to use this hearty name for her mother-in-law. ‘My brothers are staying with my people over at Plumstead, and they’ll be looking us up. Geoff is on four months’ leave from Burma, and John is at home while his ship refits. They want to see Rose Birkett again. They quite fell for her at the school sports. What a pretty kid she is, but the brains of a louse – sorry, Mater, mouse I meant. Well, Mr Merton, and how has the great world been treating you?’
Mr Merton said he had no complaints to make of it, except that it kept him up rather late in the season. Then Mrs Keith and Edith went to see the children put to bed, so Noel and Kate went for a walk, while Colin returned to his books. Their talk was very restful and pleasant, being mostly about Kate’s family. Kate said she was a little worried about Lydia, because she wouldn’t trouble to conceal her feelings when she disliked people.
‘Do you remember,’ she said, ‘how very rude she was to Mr Winter, the day of the picnic? And then at Colin’s tea-party the
other day she was so rude to Rose Birkett that I was quite alarmed. Rose is so stupid for such a pretty creature that I don’t think she noticed, but the boys did; I saw them looking at each other. Mr Merton, why do you encourage her to be silly?’
‘Do you think you need say Mr Merton?’ said Noel.
‘Certainly not, if you like,’ said Kate calmly. ‘We all say Noel behind your back, but with Lydia Christian-naming everyone at sight, someone has to hold back a bit. Noel, do you have to behave so badly with Rose, and make her worse? It makes poor Mr Winter wretched.’
Noel felt what he recognised as an unreasonable touch of annoyance that Winter’s fate should interest Kate, and suppressed it, remarking that Rose simply asked for it.
‘But Mr Winter doesn’t,’ said Kate. ‘And it will be a very uncomfortable weekend if the party from the Rectory come over on Sunday, or we go to tennis there, and Mr Winter has the sulks on your account. Do you think, Noel, you could refrain from that form of amusement?’
‘Do you want me to?’
‘Please,’ said Kate, stopping, laying a hand on his arm, and looking up at him.
‘Did you ever look in the beginning of a little book of Hardy’s poems that I sent you by Lydia?’ asked Noel, rather alarmed at himself, but unable to resist the lure of a mild situation.
‘Oh yes,’ said Kate. ‘It said “With your humble duty”.’
Her voice was always sweet, and Noel couldn’t say whether it sounded any sweeter than usual.
‘Well, that holds good,’ said Noel, in a low, thrilling voice, more alarmed than ever at the way he was behaving.
‘You mean you won’t encourage Rose to – well, flirt with you?’ said Kate, wanting to be sure.
‘Not if you don’t like it.’
‘Thank you so much,’ said Kate, walking on. ‘You can’t think what a difference it will make.’
‘Does it matter so much to you then if I flirt, as you call it, with Rose?’ said Noel, adding to himself Shut up, you blasted fool.
‘It matters frightfully,’ said Kate in heartfelt accents.
Noel wondered if he was going to propose to her. He didn’t want to in the least, and it was against his principles, but if his promising not to dally with Rose Birkett meant so much to Kate, he might find himself in honour bound. And then he suddenly remembered Everard Carter, for whom he had taken a great liking, and wished someone would come and rescue him.
‘Because,’ Kate went on, ‘if Rose is silly, it makes Mr Winter so cross, and that is horrid for Colin.’
‘Yes, I see,’ said Noel.
Kate then related to Noel several delightful and, as it seemed to him, rather pointless anecdotes about her nephew and niece, and so talking of one thing and another they reached the house again. As they came in, the sudden gloom of the hall, with curtains drawn against the afternoon sun, made Noel feel half blind. From the gloom, Kate spoke.
‘I wish you weren’t going to Austria,’ she said, in a voice like a prayer.
‘Why?’
‘Oh, a foolish reason,’ said Kate seriously. ‘So foolish I can’t tell you, Noel.’
She went upstairs to dress for dinner. As she dressed she considered her conversation with Noel. It had been very nice of him to promise not to bait Rose, but to her mind his profession of humble duty was a trifle overdone. She admitted that the inscription had appeared to her at the time excessively romantic. She could remember the actual thrill that the words, in Noel’s queer, spiky, upright hand, had given her. It had been a weakening, but not disagreeable sensation, to feel a dithering feeling about where she would have liked to think her heart was placed, though it certainly felt much more like her stomach, whenever she thought of or re-read those remarkable words, but the sensation had not lasted long. After a week, in spite of valiant attempts at recapture, she had lost it entirely, and could only conclude that it was not true love. It was certainly always very pleasant to see Noel again, and nothing could have been nicer than his behaviour to her personally at Colin’s party, but his thoughtless conduct with Rose had seemed to her rather selfish. If people did things that might lead to trouble for Colin, she could not like them quite so much as if they didn’t, and she had gathered, though Colin hadn’t actually complained, that Mr Winter’s temper had been more difficult than usual after the sports. If only everyone could be nice and kind like Colin or Mr Carter. There was something particularly nice and friendly about a man who carried waistcoat buttons about with him in a vinaigrette in case of need, and he had been very kind to Colin. A man like Mr Carter, Everard as Colin called him, would not go to Austria when he might stay happily in London all through the Long Vacation, helping Colin to read law. Schoolmasters, she decided, were nicer than lawyers, because they thought more of others. She felt quite sure that if Colin or anyone needed help, Everard Carter would give it, at whatever inconvenience to himself. It was nice that he was coming for the weekend, and if Lydia were happily occupied with Noel and Colin and the three boys and the pond, perhaps there would be a chance for her to take Everard for a walk by themselves. With this thought she went down to dinner, and was able to give her undivided attention to the question of where they should have tea on Sunday. Mrs Keith was of opinion that if it were fine it would be nice to have it in the garden-room on the terrace, but if it were wet or cold, the drawing-room would be the best place. Everyone agreed, but no one could say what the weather would be at five o’clock the day after tomorrow, so no decision was reached.
Noel’s dressing thoughts had been less pleasant. With all his perception he had not quite realised that Colin was, up to the present, the most important person in Kate’s life. When she reproached him for misleading Rose, he had at first suspected her of a leaning towards Winter, and then decided he was mistaken. Still, some explanation there must be for her insistence, and without being fatuous he felt she might resent his attentions to Rose or feel them as a slight to herself. She had been so charming to him and then her voice had almost broken as she said she wished he weren’t going to Austria, and wouldn’t tell him why, and what on earth was a man to do? One didn’t want to exaggerate one’s own value or her feelings, but if she felt so strongly it might be kinder to go away, and certainly safer. He liked the Keith family, he liked Colin very much, he found Lydia a permanent source of amusement, but to fall in love with Kate, or be fallen in love with, would not be in the least what he meant. The universal uncle went down to dinner in doubt and discouragement, but as Kate seemed quite herself, and as friendly as ever, he tried to put the incident away. After dinner Kate went over to the Twickers’ cottage to talk to the gardener’s wife about the visitors, and as everyone went to bed early he did not see her again that night. At two in the morning he woke up and thought of Everard Carter, and the thought did not relieve his mind.
Neither had the Rectory had an altogether serene evening. After the meeting with Noel and Lydia on the river, Rose had chosen to consider her feelings insulted by Lydia, and was quite angry because Philip would not agree with her.
‘But, Rose,’ said Philip, as they walked up the garden to the Rectory, ‘all Lydia did was to swim round the boat. She didn’t mean to splash you, and after all she’s only a kid, like Geraldine.’
Rose said it was Rudeness she couldn’t bear.
‘Well, if it comes to that, you were rather rude, too,’ said Philip. ‘You asked Merton to tea and never said a word to Lydia.’
Rose said Geraldine could ask Lydia if she wanted to, and anyway Lydia was only a kid, and Philip had said so himself, and wouldn’t expect to be asked, and if Philip liked Lydia better than her he had better say so.
Philip said, almost roughly, that Rose was being silly, and things simply couldn’t go on like this, upon which Rose burst into tears, and rushing upstairs to her room, yelled with such abandonment that the servants all said it was Miss Rose again.
Mrs Birkett, reading in the garden, heard her daughter’s distress coming through the window. She hoped it would stop if she
did nothing, but Rose was of sterner stuff, and went on sobbing, with an occasional tear-stained look out of the window to see if her mother had heard. It was no good knocking with so much noise going on, so Mrs Birkett went straight in.
‘What is the matter, Rose?’ she said.
‘Boo-hoo,’ said Rose.
‘Now, try to stop crying and tell me what it is,’ said Mrs Birkett. ‘Everyone can hear you.’
Rose said she would like everyone to hear her, because it would show them how sickening Philip was.
‘Well,’ said her mother, ‘what has he done?’
Rose said he liked Lydia Keith better than her, and that being so, why did he ever get engaged to her, and she wished she were dead.
Summer Half: A Virago Modern Classic (VMC) Page 18
