I thought the boys were feeling quite as much embarrassed as I was and I counted on food to unbutton us all. They ordered, as I knew they would, smoked salmon and roast chicken and then politely tried to put me at my ease.
‘Did you have a good journey?’
‘Was it a Viscount?’
‘Have you seen the new Anouilh in Paris?’
‘Have you read Pinfold?’
I said yes to everything but was too much preoccupied to enlarge on these topics. General conversation was really not possible under the circumstances; I ordered a bottle of wine and bravely plunged. ‘Perhaps you’ll tell me now what this is all about?’
Charlie and Sigi looked at Fabrice who was evidently the spokesman. ‘Are you furious with us?’ he said.
‘I’m more worried than furious. Your fathers are very angry indeed. But why did you do it?’
‘The ghoulishness of the food –’ Sigi said, in a high wail.
‘It’s no good telling me about the food,’ I said firmly, ‘because I know perfectly well that had nothing to do with it. I’d like the real reason, please.’
‘You must try and put yourself in our place,’ said Fabrice, ‘wasting the best years of our lives (only three more as teenagers – every day so precious, when we ought to be hitting it up as never again), wasting them in that dark creepy one-horse place with Son et Lumière (the head beak) and all the other old weirdies yattering at us morning and night and those ghoulish kids mouldering in the same grave with us. It’s a living death, Mum; we’ve been cheesed off for months. In the end it became more than flesh and blood could stand. Do you blame us?’
I was uncertain how to say what must be said. ‘What’s that you’ve got on your jersey, Charles?’
‘Yank’s the Boy for Me. Do you like it?’
‘Only rather. Who is Yank?’
‘Who is Yank? Yanky Fonzy of course, the Birmingham-born Bomb. I should have thought even you would have heard of Yank – that lanky Yank from Brum – the toughest guy that breathes. He’s a disc star.’
‘And he’s the boy for you?’
‘Oh definitely. Of course he’s a man’s man, you might not dig him like we do, lots of girls don’t and hardly any oldsters. But we’re his fans, the screamin’ kids who follow him round the Beat Shows. Boy! does he wow us!’
‘Oh,’ I said, flummoxed.
‘You ought to come and see for yourself,’ said Sigi. ‘Tout comprendre c’est tout pardonner!’
‘Do you think I would understand though?’
‘If you saw you would,’ said Fabrice. ‘Yank, coming right into the attack – treating the kids like a man squeezing an orange. That ole mike is putty in his hands; he rolls on the floor with it – uses it as a gun – throws it around, spins it, I snarls into it. Then, sudden, dramatic, he quiets down into a religioso: “I count them over, every one apart, my Rosary.” From that it’s Schehera-jazz: “Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar.” “Oh Shenandoah, I long to hear you.” Ending up with the patriotic stuff: “Shoot if you must this old grey head but spare my country’s Flag, she said.” Something for everybody, see?’
‘Oh Mum, do try and realize how it makes jolly boating weather seem like a rice pudding.’
‘Perhaps I do. But all this has no connexion with real life, which is very long, very serious and for which, at your age, you ought to be preparing.’
‘No. The whole point is that we are too old, now, to be preparing. This is life, it has begun, we want to be living.’
‘Dearest, that’s for your parents to decide. As we support you we must be allowed to have a say in your activities, I suppose?’
‘Ah! But I’m just coming to that. Teenagers are definitely commercial nowadays. It’s not like we-were back in history – David Copperfield. The modern Copperfield doesn’t have to tramp to Dover and find Aunt Betsy – no – he is rich – he earns £9 a week. That’s what we are making; not bad for a start?’
‘£9 a week?’ I was very much taken aback. Starving animals in the snow, indeed! This was going to make my task difficult if not impossible.’ For doing what, may I inquire?’
‘Packing.’
‘That’s nearly £500 a year!’
‘Definitely.’
‘What do you pack?’
‘Shavers – you know, razors.’
‘Do you like it?’
‘Does anybody like work?’
I snatched at this opening.
‘Oh, indeed they do, when it’s interesting. That’s the whole point of lessons, so that one can finally have work which is more enjoyable than packing.’
‘Yes, that’s what we’ve heard. We don’t believe it. We think all work is the same and it’s during the time off that you live your life. No use wasting these precious years preparing for jobs that may be far worse than packing when we shall be old and anyway not able to feel anything, good or bad. As it is we get two days off and our evenings. In between we are inspired by Yank.’
‘But my dear children, you can’t go on packing for the rest of your lives. You must think of the future.’
‘Why must we? All you oldies thought and thought of the future and slaved and saved for the future, and where did it get you?’
‘It got your father to Paris.’
‘And what good does that do him? How many days off does he get? How does he spend his evenings? Who is his idol?’
‘In any case it’s now we want to be enjoying ourselves, not when we are rotting from the feet up at thirty or something ghoulish.’
‘Just tell me,’ I said, ‘were you unhappy at Eton? People hardly ever are, in my experience.’
They looked at each other. ‘No – not exactly unhappy. It was this feeling of waste we had.’
‘It wasn’t the Perthshire Set?’ I knew that when they first arrived they had been teased (according to their own statements, discounted by me, positively martyrized) by Scotch boys larger and older than they, one of whom was Sigi’s fag-master, who were alleged to have stolen their money and borrowed and broken such treasures as cameras, besides inflicting dire physical torments on them.
‘Ay, the gret black monolisks fra’ Pitlochry,’ said Fabrice, ‘a’ change heer for Ballachulish.’ The others were shaking with laughter at what was evidently an ancient and well-loved joke. ‘Nu – now we are na’ longer wee bairnies they canna scaith us.’
‘You didn’t leave because of them?’
‘They are still ghoulish (in Pop now) but no, definitely not.’
‘And you haven’t been beaten this half?’
‘Oh definitely. I was beaten for covering a boy with baby-powder and Sigi was for holding a boy’s head under the bathwater.’
‘Sigi!’ There was such horror in my voice that he looked quite startled and quickly said, ‘But I didn’t hold it for as long as they thought.’
‘Mum – nobody minds being beaten, you know.’
‘Speak for yourself, Charlie,’ said Fabrice, making a face.
‘Of course it’s rather ghoulish pacing up and down one’s room before. But not nearly enough for running away. Our reasons were positive, not negative.’
The others agreed. ‘Definitely. It was the feeling that life was passing us by and we weren’t getting the best out of it.’
‘Packing and rocking and rolling aren’t the best, either. They will stop wowing you very soon and then where will you be?’
‘By then nothing will matter any more. Our teens will have gone and we shall be old and we shall die. Isn’t it sad!’
‘Very sad but not quite true. You will get old and die, but after the end of your teens until your deathbeds there will be endless years to fill in somehow. Are you going to spend them all, all those thousands of days, packing shavers? Is it for this that you were created?’
‘You see, you haven’t understood, just like we were so afraid you wouldn’t.’
‘Why don’t you come back with me to Paris in the morning?’
They looked at each ot
her uncomfortably. ‘You see, we think London is a better town to live in at our age. Paris isn’t much good for teenagers.’
‘Definitely less commercial.’
‘So you won’t come?’
‘You see, we’ve signed on for our work.’
It was evidently no good pursuing the subject so we spoke of other things. They asked how Northey was. ‘By the way,’ I said, ‘she’s a teenager but she’s perfectly happy in Paris; she loves it.’
They said, scornfully but quite affectionately, that she had never acted like a teenager.
‘Act is the word,’ I said, beginning to lose my temper, ‘acting and showing off. If you had to leave Eton why couldn’t you have gone at the end of the half instead of having a scene with your tutor and hiring a Rolls Royce to take you, in full view of everybody? So vulgar, I’m ashamed of you. And how I wish you knew how babyish you look in that silly fancy dress.’
‘This dinner party is going downhill,’ said Fabrice.
‘Definitely,’ said Sigi.
‘Ghoulish,’ said Charlie.
‘Yes. I think I’m tired after the journey.’ I looked at my children and thought how little I knew them. I felt much more familiar with David and Baz. No doubt it was because these boys had always been inseparable. As with dogs, so with children, one on its own is a more intimate pet than two or three. The death of my second baby had made a gap between David and Basil; I had had each of them in the nursery by himself. I suppose I had hardly ever been alone with either of the other two in my life; I was not at all sure what they were really like.
‘Don’t be tired,’ said Fabrice. ‘We thought we’d take you to the Finsbury Empire. It’s not Yank unfortunately (he’s in Liverpool) but quite a good pop show.’
‘Darling – no, I can’t anyhow. I promised I’d ring up Sigi’s mother and tell the news. She’s expecting a baby, Sigi.’
If I’d hoped to soften him with this statement I was disappointed. ‘I know!’ he said furiously. ‘It really is too bad of her. What about the unearned income? There’ll be nothing for any of us if she goes on like this.’
‘Lucky you’re so good at packing.’ I felt I had scored a point.
As soon as the children had finished their pudding I paid the bill and said good-bye to them. There seemed to be no point in prolonging the interview only to hear, as I was already sick of hearing from David and Baz, what a ghastly (or ghoulish) failure Alfred and I had made of our lives; how we had wasted our youth and to what purpose? It was true that I was tired and, in fact, deeply depressed and upset. I had been unable to touch my dinner; I longed to be alone and lie down in the dark. First, however, I telephoned to Grace. (Alfred I knew was dining out, I would speak to him in the morning.) She was not surprised to hear about the crooner.
‘It went on the whole summer at Bellandargues – lanky Yank the Boy from Brum, till I could have killed them. You didn’t quite take it in when I told you. It’s an absolute mania. But then, Fanny, aren’t they getting hard up?’
‘I’m coming to that,’ I said, just as Fabrice had, ‘hold everything, it’s far the worst part. They’ve got a job – they’re quite all right for money and I’d just like you to guess what they are earning.’
‘Perhaps – I don’t know – they couldn’t be worth £3 a week?’
‘Nine.’
‘Pounds a week? Each? But it’s perfectly insane! We shall never get them back now.’
‘Exactly.’
‘But what do they get it for?’
‘Packing, Grace. They pack all day, five days a week, in order to have their evenings free for the Birmingham-born Bomb.’
There was a long pause while she digested this fact. Then she said, ‘My dear, the person who gives Sigismond £9 a week to pack for him must be out of his mind. I only wish you could see his box when he comes back from school!’
The next day at Orly the lively face of Northey was in the crowd waiting for friends by the entrance. There was something about the mere sight of that child which made my spirits rise, as that of my own boys, alas, no longer did. She had hopped into the Rolls Royce when she saw it leaving the Embassy. ‘Anything to down tools for an hour or two,’ she said, frankly, adding, ‘hot news!’
‘Don’t, Northey!’
‘Good news I mean – Coffirep has had children. Oh dear, I’m so over-excited –!’
‘Dearest – is that the badger?’
‘Fanny, do sharpen your wits and concentrate on my life. Coffirep is my shares – so I’m rich, my old age will be nice, oh do be pleased!’
‘I can’t tell you how delighted I am, specially about it not being the badger.’
‘As if he could all alone, poor duck. In the spring I’ll get him a sweet little wife – I’m sure he’s made a breeding chamber down there, we don’t want him to feel disappointed. Oh, I was dying to tell somebody. Alfred didn’t properly listen (he’s in a do about the boys); Philip only said he wished he knew if there really is any marketable oil in the Sahara; the holies don’t care about money, or so they say. (I note they always make me pay the cab if we go in one.) And Charles-Édouard is shooting, which he calls hunting, in Champagne. It’s very dull having nobody to take an interest – thank goodness you are back.’
Not another word about the boys; she was either being tactful or was too much occupied with her own affairs – the latter I suspected. She babbled on until we got home. When we drove into the courtyard I saw a group of people, who were obviously not followers, waiting by Northey’s entrance.
‘Mr Ward,’ she explained, ‘has very kindly allowed me to put up a notice in W. H. Smith offering my kittens to good homes. It gives me a lot of extra work, taking up references and so on; they have to be rather special people as you may imagine. They must promise not to – you know – castrate; they must live on the ground floor with a garden (I go myself and see), and above all they must not be related to any scientist, chemist or furrier. The kits aren’t ready to leave me and Katie yet; this is only for when they are.’
Of course Mockbar duly informed the world that Envoy’s Sons had left Eton because the headmaster had threatened to thrash them and were now employed by the London firm of such-and-such in their packing department. Mockbar hardly annoyed me any more nor even extracted a wry laugh; I was getting used to his style and the observations which punctuated all our doings. His paragraphs no longer made me tremble for Alfred’s career. Six million people read them, so one was told, and evidently regarded them as enjoyable fiction. He was too often obliged, by the solicitors of some victim, to withdraw a statement for the public to place much reliance in his word.
A few days later Charles-Édouard left hurriedly for London. To my secret rage and disgust he returned that same evening with Master Sigismond in tow. Grace informed me of this, adding, ‘He cracked the whip, darling. Thank God I married a Frenchman. Whatever you may say, they do have some authority in the family!’
‘The thing is, Alfred can’t go over just now; I don’t feel I ought to worry him by suggesting that he should. He’s having a difficult time, he’s busy.’
‘He must be. The English! Words can’t express what I feel! They are being quite simply too awful. I’m sure Sir Alfred can’t approve. Having that Niam on an official visit! Fanny, it’s the limit. He has eaten simply hundreds of Frenchmen and now he’s got a loan from Stalin – yes, I know, but they’re all Stalin to me, I can’t keep learning their new names – so that he can catch and eat hundreds more.’
‘Nonsense, Grace. In a profile of Dr Niam I read somewhere, they said he is a vegetarian and very pro-French at heart.’
‘At stomach they mean. Oh good, I’ve made a joke, I must tell Charles-Édouard. I’ve been too pregnant, lately.’
‘They say he’s firmly attached to the Western World and has a great sense of humour.’
‘Oh, do shut up. Are the English our allies or are they not?’
How I wished I knew what whip, cracked by his father, had brought Sigismond to
heel. Cracking whips seemed to be something of which neither Alfred nor I was capable. When our boys refused to listen to reason we were done for. It was beginning to be borne in on me that as parents we were a resounding failure. While all three boys had been in full revolt I could just bear it; now that Sigi had returned to parental authority, the evil conduct of our two was stressed. Surely we, too, ought to be able to find some way of mastering them?
‘Hot news I’ said Northey. ‘Guess why Sigi is here?’
‘I thought M. de Valhubert went over and cracked a whip?’
‘Yes, well, if you really want to know, he went over because Sigi was in bad with the police. He was caught nicking shavers.’
‘Doing what, dearest?’
‘They were packing shavers – you knew that, didn’t you? And were getting £9 a week, which, incidentally, makes skilled secretarial work in embassies seem rather underpaid but let that pass. Clever Sigi discovered that if you nick a few every day (no, Fanny, don’t keep asking what things mean, sharpen your wits and listen) you can bump up the screw to quite a pound more. But as he’s not used to stealing, so far, he was caught and there was a fearful rumpus. Charles-Édouard had to go and buy him off or he’d have gone to a remand home or something. Can you beat it!’
I felt a glow of superiority. ‘Poor Grace,’ I said, ‘how dreadful.’
‘By the way, the old foreign lady is not to be told.’
‘Ah! Quite right – of course she mustn’t be. So is Charles-Édouard furious?’
‘Not a bit. He thinks it’s most frightfully funny and he’s delighted to have Sigi delivered into his hands. Now he’ll be obliged to go to the strict Jesuits after all?’
‘I shouldn’t think even the strictest Jesuits will do that boy much good – he’ll come to a bad end all right.’
Northey bashed me out of my complacency with: ‘Charlie and Fabrice have got the knack of it now.’
‘The knack of nicking?’
‘Yes. Sigi says he invented a foolproof method on the way over and rang them up to tell, very kindly. They’ll get lovely and rich, he says, in no time.’
Don't Tell Alfred Page 20
