The Summer House Party

by Caro Fraser

  ‘Diana, this is Roddy MacLennan – Roddy, my sister Diana.’

  Diana shook hands with Roddy. ‘How d’you do? Meg tells me you’re part of the racing team?’

  ‘That’s right.’ He glanced down apologetically at his oil-stained overalls. ‘Sorry about the rig.’ Despite his Scottish surname, Roddy’s voice and accent were impeccably English, and he spoke with a slight stammer, which Diana found charming.

  ‘Please don’t apologise – awfully workmanlike.’ She gave a smiling glance at Paul’s faultless tweeds. ‘I see my brother doesn’t propose to get his hands dirty.’

  ‘Hardly fair,’ replied Paul in mock resentment. ‘Roddy’s our new driver. It’s his job to get mucky. As Latimer-Hitchens’ team manager I need to look immaculate.’

  ‘We’re taking the car over to Chalvey airfield tomorrow,’ said Guy. ‘Roddy’s test driving the new engine. Why don’t you come?’

  ‘How very dashing.’ Diana gave Roddy a smile. ‘Unfortunately I have to be back in London this evening.’

  Meg came out to the terrace. ‘Lunch will be another half-hour, I’m afraid. Cook is struggling rather with the mayonnaise.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Paul. ‘That gives Roddy time for a wash and brush-up. But first I have something to show you all.’

  ‘Not a car, I hope?’ said Diana.

  ‘Not a car.’ Paul led the way from the terrace across the lawn in the direction of the paddock and stables.

  ‘Morning, Dixon,’ called Paul. The young groom-gardener, who was busy in the yard, touched his cap to the party. Paul led the way in.

  ‘Allow me to introduce you to The Commander.’

  In the loose box stood a magnificent chestnut. He whinnied and nickered as Paul approached with a handful of hay, lowering his muzzle to take it.

  ‘Isn’t he a beauty?’

  There were murmurs of admiration. Roddy stepped forward and ran his hands appreciatively over the horse’s neck and flanks, making Diana wish she could do the same to Roddy. ‘He’s perfectly built for steeplechasing. What is he – sixteen hands?’

  Paul nodded. ‘And a bit. I paid a hundred guineas for him, I don’t mind telling you. I can’t wait to get him out in the field next season. I bought a nice-tempered little mare for Meg at the same time. It was love at first sight, wasn’t it, darling?’

  Meg nodded. ‘She’s called Grisette. You can see her in a moment. I don’t pretend I’ll ever be the world’s greatest horsewoman, but Dixon says I’m making good progress. And from Dixon, that’s high praise indeed, I can assure you.’

  After Grisette had been duly inspected and admired, they set off back to the house for lunch.

  ‘It’s such a nice day, I propose we have it on the terrace instead of inside,’ suggested Paul.

  ‘What a lovely idea,’ said Diana. She glanced at Meg’s face, and fell back a step beside her. ‘You don’t seem keen,’ she murmured.

  ‘Oh no, it’s an excellent idea. I’m just worried that it will inconvenience the maid to have to re-lay the table outside. I hate putting her out.’

  Diana could see it was going to take Meg some time to acquire the necessary confidence to make her the supreme mistress of her household. ‘My dear, you mustn’t worry about putting the servants to trouble – it’s what they’re for.’

  ‘Yes, you’re right,’ said Meg. ‘I’ll speak to her.’

  As she crossed the springy turf of the paddock, her arm linked in Diana’s, Meg lifted her head and looked around her, reminding herself how extraordinarily lucky she was. She had Paul, and Hazelhurst too, and with a little practice she would learn to manage them both.

  The constraints that Meg usually felt when lunching with Paul and his friends were lifted by Diana’s presence. Diana evinced a lively interest in all things to do with racing cars, and the Grand Prix season in particular; Meg found it hard to tell whether it was genuine or not, but she found Diana’s enthusiasm transformed the subject, making it more interesting than she had hitherto found it. Perhaps the key was to encourage men to talk about what interested them, rather than endure the awkwardness of forcing them to look for polite alternatives.

  ‘Switzerland and Monaco – how grand! If I were you, Meg, I would insist on going too. There’s something terribly thrilling about powerful motor cars – and if it got too tiresome, you could always go shopping.’

  ‘We’re not quite ready for the championship circuit yet,’ said Guy. ‘The non-championship venues aren’t quite so glamorous, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Besides, I’m not sure Paul would welcome my presence,’ said Meg. ‘I’d just get in the way.’

  ‘I would think any man would be delighted to have such a delightful distraction,’ said Roddy gallantly.

  Paul smiled and helped himself to mayonnaise, but said nothing to encourage the idea.

  As the meal progressed, and the talk turned to London and the season, Meg gradually became aware that surreptitious flirting was going on between Diana and Roddy. It was driven mainly by Diana, but Roddy’s subtle responses were unmistakable. Given that the two of them had only just met, Meg was somewhat surprised, but she couldn’t help admiring Diana’s technique. Paul noticed too, and registered his mild disapproval with glances and a couple of marked silences. But neither Diana nor Roddy seemed aware, and the flirtatious banter continued. Why, Meg wondered, did Paul have to be so stuffy at times?

  When the meal was over, Guy and Roddy announced they were going back to the workshop to carry on with the engine modifications. Paul rose to join them, but Diana laid a detaining hand on his arm.

  ‘I insist you stay and entertain me for a little while longer, brother dearest. I haven’t seen you in a month, and I have a few things I need to talk to you about.’

  Meg took this as a cue to make herself scarce. She guessed that Diana had need of money, as she so often did, and would want to make any application to Paul in private.

  ‘I have some letters to attend to, so I’ll leave you in peace. I’ll tell Mary to clear lunch away.’

  Meg was halfway to the morning room when she realised that she had left her letters in the drawing room. She went back to retrieve them, and as she did so she heard Paul’s voice from the terrace saying, ‘The way you behaved towards Roddy was, quite frankly, nothing short of embarrassing.’ There was a harshness in his voice which she had never heard before, and it made her pause.

  ‘Oh dear, do I detect a note of jealousy?’ she heard Diana reply. ‘I hope you’re not in love with him, the way you were with that Bettany boy.’

  ‘Don’t be disgusting.’

  ‘Who says it’s disgusting? You men are so wrong-headed about that kind of thing. Anyway, thanks for the cheque, brother dearest. I don’t know where the money goes.’

  ‘I think I do.’

  Meg moved away from the window and quickly left the room, shocked. She thought anxiously for a while about what Diana had said, but came to the conclusion that referring to Paul being in love with a man was simply another of her careless turns of phrase. Paul was devoted to his friends – everyone knew that. He was, as Meg often found herself saying to people, ‘very much a man’s man’. It meant nothing, she decided, and resolved to think no more about it.

  6

  AS THE MONTHS passed, Meg began to feel she was making headway. The tennis court was finished, and she had succeeded in recruiting a couple of respectable housemaids, Gwen and Enid, and a kitchen maid, Maud, to help Mrs Runcie. She had begun to make friends in the area, although the women whom she had befriended, such as the vicar’s wife and Anna Kentleigh, the wife of a wealthy neighbouring landowner, both had young families, which kept them busy at times when Meg was not. She had hoped that there might by now be signs that she and Paul would soon have a family of their own, but so far she was disappointed. She told herself that it was hardly surprising, since they had only been married a few months, but at the same time she couldn’t help thinking that the chances might have been a little higher if Paul had been at ho
me more. He seemed preoccupied with his business, and was away more often than she had anticipated.

  Finding time hanging heavy on her hands that autumn, she invited her mother to stay while Paul was abroad with his racing team. When he arrived home at the end of the week she hurried out to meet him.

  ‘I thought you’d be home last night,’ she said, as she kissed him. ‘I was getting worried. You should have called.’

  ‘The boat train got in very late, so I stayed at the club and picked up the car this morning. Sorry, I didn’t think to call.’ He came inside with Meg and greeted his mother-in-law. ‘How are you, Helen? I’m glad someone’s been keeping Meg company.’

  ‘How was Czechoslovakia?’ asked Helen.

  ‘The racing was fine. We had an excellent time, though we didn’t come anywhere. The Germans saw to that. They win pretty much everything, and they’re insufferably arrogant about it, too, I can tell you.’

  ‘And about a lot of other things besides car races. Mr Hitler is getting far too big for his boots, if you ask me,’ said Helen.

  ‘I’m so glad to have you back,’ said Meg. ‘Promise me you won’t be going anywhere for at least a month?’

  ‘I promise.’ He dropped a kiss on her forehead. ‘I’ll come and join you shortly. I just need to freshen up. Oh, by the way, I ran into Dan Ranscombe at Bellamy’s last night. I asked him if he’d like to come down next month. James Kentleigh has invited us to shoot on his estate on the eighteenth. I’ll probably ask Guy and Roddy as well.’ He caught Meg’s expression. ‘You don’t look best pleased. I thought you liked having people down.’

  ‘I’m perfectly happy about it,’ replied Meg, searching for an excuse for her reaction. ‘I just sometimes wish we had some female company as well.’

  ‘Then why don’t you invite Diana? She knows everyone. And she’s a pretty good shot.’ As he turned to go back to his study, Paul added, ‘Guy could bring Amy along, I suppose, and Roddy and Dan are bound to have girlfriends on the go. I might ask them to bring a female guest or two. Then you won’t feel so outnumbered.’

  Meg wished she could have greeted Paul’s announcement that he had invited Dan to stay with calm indifference, but somehow it bothered her. She tried to rationalise her feelings, and eventually decided that the heart of the problem was the way things had been allowed to get out of hand last year. She should have kept the relationship on a friendly level and never let things go any further. She and Dan had got themselves tangled up in a silly mess over a few kisses, and his behaviour had become unkind and rather absurd as a result. The last conversation they’d had in spring had demonstrated that. A pity, really, because they’d got on so well in the beginning, and when he wasn’t being marvellously conceited and presumptuous about certain things, he was fun to be with. So the best thing to do was to put it behind her – none of it could possibly matter, after all, now that she was married – and start things over again, on a sensible level, when they next met.

  *

  A fortnight later, Meg decided to go to town and do some shopping. Her mother had gone on her annual sojourn to Biarritz, so Diana invited Meg to stay at the flat. She arrived a little after seven, and Diana answered the door in her petticoat.

  ‘There you are! I couldn’t remember when you said you were arriving.’ She gave Meg a kiss and ushered her inside. ‘I’ve given the maid the evening off. Come and chat to me. I’m just getting ready to go out.’ Meg set down her overnight case and followed Diana through to her bedroom. ‘I’m meeting some friends at the Ritz for cocktails, and then probably going on to some club or other for supper,’ said Diana, bending towards her dressing table mirror to dab make-up on her face. She glanced at Meg’s reflection. ‘You’re most welcome to come along, if you’d like.’

  ‘Sweet of you, but to be honest, I’m most awfully tired.’

  ‘If you’re sure. The spare room is all in order, and you know where everything is. Do help yourself to a drink, if you like. I’m just going to finish getting ready.’

  Meg dropped her bag in the spare room, then wandered through to the drawing room. Ten minutes later Diana appeared in the doorway, swathed in an elegant grey coat with a high fur collar, silver evening bag in hand.

  ‘Are you sure you’ll be all right? There’s a set of keys in the left-hand drawer of the hall table. Don’t forget to take them with you if you go out. I’ll see you tomorrow. Nighty-night!’

  A moment later Meg heard the front door slam, and silence descended. As she sat leafing through the latest copy of Harper’s Bazaar, it occurred to her that the last time she had been here in the flat was on her wedding night. She tried to dismiss that memory. She had become used by now to compartmentalising her relationship with Paul, concentrating on the interest and amusement of its daylight hours, and relegating sex and the hours of darkness to a place that didn’t matter. Yet after a few minutes some impulse made her get up and wander through to his bedroom. She gazed round the starkly masculine interior, and allowed herself to admit the disappointment of the sexual relationship which she endured, rather than enjoyed. Perhaps if their marriage had started somewhere else – a neutral room in a foreign hotel, a place not freighted with Paul’s bachelor past, and whatever it held – they might be different people to one another now. We were never lovers, thought Meg. We became husband and wife without ever having become lovers. She knew in her heart that that had been a mistake, but it was one that couldn’t be undone now.

  She crossed the room, and inspected again the sixth form and university sporting pictures that hung above the desk, glancing along the rows of young faces, and the names below. This time, one of the names rang a bell. She concentrated for a moment. Then it came back to her, the fragment of conversation between Paul and Diana that she had overheard a few weeks ago after lunch. She counted along the row until she found the face that matched Arthur Bettany’s name, and studied it. He was undoubtedly attractive, his features marked by a certain soft-lipped petulance and dark-eyed arrogance. He was dressed in cricket whites, gazing challengingly at the camera with a hint of a smile. Paul, as team captain, stood a couple of places away from him in the centre of the photograph. Meg’s gazed shifted between the two, as if trying to detect some connection. Then she glanced at the photograph of the university rowing team on the desk and realised that the young man in the affectionate embrace of Paul’s arm, his own arm around Paul’s waist, was also Arthur Bettany. She was suddenly struck by the intimacy of their pose. Ridiculous, she told herself. She recalled schoolgirl crushes from her own adolescence; probably much the same thing happened with young men. She turned away from the photos and went back to the drawing room to pour herself a drink.

  *

  Diana and Meg spent the following morning clothes shopping in the West End.

  ‘I can’t imagine how you’ll get through the winter with just five new dresses,’ remarked Diana, as they left Harvey Nichols.

  ‘It’s more than enough,’ said Meg. ‘Social life in Berkshire is a lot quieter than London. There’s not much to dress up for. Except Paul, and he scarcely notices what I’m wearing most of the time.’

  ‘I’m sure he does really. It’s just that my brother is a typically undemonstrative Englishman. I’m glad that you both like living in the country so much. When I was younger, I couldn’t wait to get away. Even now I can only bear it in small doses, or if there’s some jolly house party with lots of guests.’

  ‘Oh, that reminds me,’ exclaimed Meg. ‘Paul has invited a few people down for a day’s shooting on a neighbour’s estate the weekend after next, and we want you to come. So far the guests are Guy and his fiancée, that fellow Roddy MacLennan, and Dan Ranscombe. Please say you’ll come – there could be a scarcity of women otherwise.’

  ‘I don’t think I’m busy,’ replied Diana, though her mind had been made up the moment she heard Roddy would be there. ‘It’s just a question of whether I want to go tramping through muddy countryside taking potshots at pheasants. Paul won’t let me off
the shoot, I can assure you.’

  ‘Well, I’ve never shot a thing in my life, so perhaps you can stay home and keep me company.’

  ‘My dear girl, Paul will still expect you out in the field, even if it’s just to carry a thermos of coffee. You can expect to be unwrapping a nice Purdey shotgun at Christmas. My sister-in-law will have to be able to shoot as well as hunt, and no doubt become proficient at fly-fishing, too.’ Diana glanced at Meg and laughed. ‘Don’t look so worried. Shooting isn’t difficult – which is just as well, given the number of dimwits who do it. And pheasants are pleasingly slow-moving targets.’

  ‘It’s just that I’m not especially keen on killing things.’

  ‘You’re not likely to, on your first time out,’ said Diana briskly. ‘Now, shall we find somewhere for tea?’

  ‘I don’t think so, thanks. I know Paul would prefer it if I’m home for dinner, so I’d better set off soon.’ She scanned the street for a taxi. ’So, will you come for the shooting?’

  ‘I wouldn’t miss it for the world,’ replied Diana.

  *

  In the days running up to the shooting party, Meg was in a fluster. She and Paul had never had so many people to stay, and she was anxious first of all about whether or not there was enough linen for the beds, and then about whether Mrs Runcie would be able to cope with cooking meals for a large number of people.

  ‘I shouldn’t fret about it,’ said Paul. ‘Kentleigh will provide lunch on the shoot. Breakfast more or less takes care of itself, so she’ll only have to concern herself with dinner on Friday and Saturday. I expect most people will want to get back to town at a decent time on Sunday. We shan’t be more than eight, which isn’t a great many.’

  ‘Do we know yet exactly how many are coming? It will help Cook to have definite numbers.’

  ‘Guy is bringing his fiancée, and I told Diana and Dan to bring friends, if they liked, but I’m not entirely sure what’s happening on that front. So we’ll just have to see who turns up.’