Christmas Pudding and Pigeon Pie

by Nancy Mitford

  ‘That ought to be easy. Paul goes away in less than a week now, when I trail back to the old col., and mother is still out hunting most of the time. Besides, several people are coming to stay here over the week-end for this bogus dance she will insist on having. I dare say she won’t notice anything much; she’s been as blind as a bat so far.’

  ‘We can only hope for the best,’ said Amabelle, who was looking out of the window. ‘Hullo, here comes my fiancé – whatever is he carrying? Oh, I say, isn’t that rather sweet, d’you see; he’s bringing two dead hens for the kitchen; he always has some exquisite present for me, the angel.’

  ‘Well, I’ll be off,’ said Bobby, rather sourly; ‘and I don’t suppose, if you’re really going to London, that I shall see you again until after you’re married, which is too awful. Look here, darling, will you promise to go and choose yourself a present at Cartier? I’ve got an account there, so get something really nice, won’t you, not a diamond hen, though, if you don’t mind.’

  20

  The dance at Compton Bobbin was in no way a riot of joyous and abandoned merriment; it was, in fact, even more dreary an entertainment than might have been anticipated, and was long afterwards remembered by Cotswold beaux and belles as ‘that frightful party at the Bobbins’. When the guests arrived, cold and dazzled after a long motor drive, they found neither the cheering strains of Terpsichore nor the sustaining draught of Bacchus awaiting them. The young man from Woodford who had been engaged to provide the former came very late indeed, so that for quite half-an-hour the guests stood about in uncertain groups, while Paul and Squibby struggled to make the wireless work. When finally he did arrive, breathless and apologetic, having left his car upside down in a ditch, his playing proved to be of that sort which induces sleep rather than revelry by night. Lady Bobbin had remained true to her resolution that in her house there should be no champagne during the national crisis, and on every hand could soon be heard the groans and curses with which British youth greets the absence of any alcohol more fortifying than beer at its parties. The rare and somewhat tipsy appearances downstairs of Bobby, the duchess, and such of their intimates as were secretly invited to the cocktail bar provided by Bobby in his bedroom, merely accentuated the wretched sobriety of the other guests.

  The duchess and Héloïse were staying with Bunch for this occasion, as also were Squibby, Biggy and Maydew. The two latter, however, had most ungallantly refused to attend the dance, giving as their excuse that they always felt sick in motor cars. Everybody else was quite well aware that they really wished to stay at home in order to play Brahms on two pianos. As a result of this monstrous behaviour the girls who had been invited by Bunch solely on their behalf spent the greater part of the evening sitting drearily together in the hall. This fact appeared to weigh rather on the duchess, who, as their chaperone, felt that she ought to feel some responsibility for their amusement.

  ‘Those wretched girls,’ she kept saying, in the intervals of helping Bobby to mix the cocktails, ‘oughtn’t I to do something about them? Shall we have them up here, darling?’

  ‘Oh, don’t let’s. They look so gloomy, and there’s hardly enough drink to go round as it is. Anyways, I expect they enjoy being together down there.’

  ‘Of course they don’t; they look furious, and I don’t blame them either. I think it’s simply odious of Biggy and Maydew to get them asked down and then stay behind like that. If I were Lady Tarradale I should be quite furious, especially as they’re certain to keep her awake all night with their awful music, and she’s been so wretchedly ill lately. Those poor charming girls, looking so sweet in their pink and green, too. I do feel badly about them. Do go and see if they’re all right, Bobby, won’t you?’

  ‘Darling, you know they’re not all right, so why bother? Besides, they’re Bunch’s guests, not mine. Let him look after them.’

  ‘Bunch has got his own girl here, Sonia Beckett. You can’t expect him to do more than dance about once with each of the others. Hullo, Héloïse, darling. Come here, sweetest, I want to whisper. Angel, is it quite necessary for you to wander about with four young men when poor Rosemary and Laetitia have no one at all to talk to them?’

  ‘I don’t think anyone wants to talk to them,’ said Héloïse; ‘they’re such cracking bores, aren’t they? Give me a cocktail, darling, quickly. This party is quite the bloodiest I’ve ever been to, personally. How right Biggy and Maydew were to stay behind. I do envy them, don’t you?’

  ‘Squibby dear,’ said the duchess, waving an empty glass at Bobby as she spoke, ‘just tell me something. Have you seen Rosemary and Laetitia latishly? Are they all right, the sweet poppets?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said the heartless Squibby. ‘I expect so. Sure to be. I saw them having a very jolly little chat with Lady Prague just now.’

  ‘You don’t think it would be rather nice if you went and saw how they were getting on?’

  ‘Well, Aunt Loudie, I don’t think I need. I’d much rather stay and talk to you. In any case, I’ve danced with both of them and they are nothing to do with me. It was Biggy and Maydew who insisted on having them asked down.’

  Paul and Philadelphia spent most of the evening shut up together in the linen cupboard, bemoaning the fact that tomorrow they must be parted, and reiterating that they intended to be faithful to each other during the months to come.

  ‘Darling, when I think,’ said Philadelphia, her voice shaking, ‘of all those lovely girls you go out with in London I do feel so terrified that you’ll soon forget all about me.’

  ‘I shan’t do that. I tell you that you have quite a special place in my heart, and you always will have. Wherever I am I shall be thinking about you the whole time. I expect I shall go about with other girls, because it would be a mistake not to, but they won’t mean anything to me really. You are, and always will be, the only woman in my life. I shall never feel about anybody as I do about you. You’re perfect, to me.’

  The fact that Paul had repeated this sentence, word for word, to at least three other women, did not prevent him, as he said it, from sincerely believing it to be the truth.

  ‘But I feel terrified too,’ he went on, ‘that you’ll decide to give me up after all and marry Michael instead. Remember, I shall never blame you in the least if you do. It would probably be much more sensible. But to me you are the only woman – ’

  At this juncture the duchess opened the linen cupboard door and popped her head round the corner.

  ‘Oh, you darlings,’ she said delightedly, ‘I’m so glad somebody’s having a lovely time. It does me good to see you. You’ve no idea what it’s been like everywhere else, too gloomy and awful for words. Now, when you’ve quite finished being happy together in there we’ve got some cocktails in Bobby’s room, so mind you come along and join us.’

  She shut the door carefully and went, bursting with her news, back to Bobby.

  ‘There they were, locked in each other’s arms. I can’t tell you how sweet they looked – the lambs. Quite frankly, I never should have thought Philadelphia had so much sense. I must ask her to stay as soon as ever we get back from Switzerland.’

  ‘Now don’t you start encouraging her,’ said Bobby crossly. ‘Amabelle and I are working like niggers to stop all this nonsense and make her get engaged to Michael.’

  ‘Oh, no, you awful child, you can’t behave like a match making mamma at your age; it’s not natural. For heaven’s sake let the poor girl have her fun, besides, it’s so good for her. Just think how pretty she’s looking now. She is a different being from what she was a month ago.’

  ‘I’m all in favour of her having as much fun as she likes,’ said Bobby, ‘so long as she’ll be sensible and not go on with all this ridiculous talk about marriage – just think, if Michael heard about it, he might quite easily be put off for good.’

  ‘You don’t seriously want her to marry Michael, do you? He’s such a fearful bore. I wouldn’t allow a daughter of mine to marry him, however much she wanted to.’ />
  ‘That’s just very silly and naughty of you, darling Auntie Loudie, because a girl’s first husband must be eligible, otherwise she will very soon go downhill altogether. Amabelle agrees with me.’

  ‘Amabelle is so frightfully pompous in these days,’ said the duchess with a hiccough. ‘I can remember the time when she was just an ordinary tart (a very successful one and all that, of course) and then she really was the greatest fun. We used to go secretly to her parties and think we were being absolute dare devils, but ever since she married old James Fortescue she’s been twice as much of a duchess as I am. It’s a great pity, because in those days she used to be too heavenly.’

  ‘I think she is still,’ said Bobby stoutly. ‘She’s one of the sweetest people in the world. Look how divine she has been to the Monteaths ever since that baby was born.’

  ‘Yes, I agree she is very sweet and kind, she always has been. I’m only saying that she’s no longer such absolutely rollicking fun. In any case, I think it’s absurd for her to take that line about Delphie. Why surely the child is rich enough to marry anybody she likes.’

  ‘She’s only rich so long as my mother chooses to make her an allowance.’

  ‘Clearly. But I suppose that even darling Gloria could hardly see her own daughter starve. I don’t understand what there is against Paul myself. He seems an exceptionally nice young man, good-looking, polite, everything one could want for a son-in-law.’

  ‘Well, to begin with, if you’d really like to know, his name isn’t Fisher at all.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘It’s Fotheringay, Paul Fotheringay.’

  ‘My dear, that’s a much nicer name than Fisher. Most romantic, too. One of Henry VIII’s wives was executed at a place called that. I remember all about it in English history.’

  ‘Darling, I don’t think you quite understand. His real name, as I said before, is Paul Fotheringay, and he is masquerading here under the alias of Fisher.’

  ‘How divinely thrilling. Wait a moment, though, wasn’t there somebody called Paul Fotheringay who wrote that screamingly funny book about pawnbrokers trying to commit suicide?’

  ‘Yes, that’s his book, Crazy Capers.’

  ‘Oh, but I’ve never laughed so much at anything before in my life. Wait a minute while I rush to the linen cupboard – it’s too bad, I haven’t my copy here for him to autograph. It was a heavenly book. Bobby, you little monster, why ever didn’t you tell me this before?’

  ‘You see he’s here in disguise really,’ said Bobby, unbending a little, ‘because he wants to write the life of Lady Maria. He asked mother in a letter whether he could borrow the journal, and she wrote back awfully rudely, so then he got taken on as my tutor and ever since then he has been studying it for his book.’

  ‘Well I should think that will be a scream,’ said the duchess. ‘Delphie will be mad if she doesn’t marry him, but if she doesn’t I shall, that’s all. What I do adore is a really good sense of humour. The funny thing is that though I’ve liked Paul from the very beginning he never struck me as being so particularly amusing, but of course that must have been entirely my own fault. Shake up one more cocktail, won’t you, Bobby, my sweet – here’s Héloïse back again. Dear, what a pudding-faced young man she has got with her this time. Where can she have picked him up? Héloïse, what do you think, Philadelphia and Paul have been sitting out for more than two hours in the linen cupboard.’

  ‘Oh, where – can I see?’

  ‘No, certainly you can’t. It’s nothing whatever to do with you. I may say I’m surprised you’ve not been in there yourself.’

  ‘If Maydew had come I don’t doubt I should have been,’ said Héloïse, ‘but all the young men here seem to be so sexless. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever been to such an awful party as this in my life. Can I introduce Mr. Wainscote to you, by the way. He has been to a lot of jolly shows lately in London, and I expect he’d like a cocktail, Bobby.’

  ‘As a matter of fact,’ said Mr. Wainscote, blushing, ‘the rest of my party is very anxious to go home – I mean,’ he added hurriedly, looking at Bobby, ‘ready to leave. We have all enjoyed ourselves immensely, but we have a long cold drive before us, so I think that perhaps I should say goodbye,’ and he edged out of the room sideways like a crab.

  ‘My darling Héloïse, what an extraordinary young man,’ said the duchess.

  ‘He’s not at all extraordinary’ said Héloïse, ‘unless you mean extraordinarily attractive. I’m rather in love with him myself,’ and she looked under long blue eyelashes at Bobby.

  ‘No cop, old girl, you can’t lead me on like that. I know you’re in a temper because I haven’t spoken to you the whole evening, but there’s no point in making a fool of yourself just the same. Have another cegocktegail?’

  ‘I degon’t megind egif egI dego,’ said Héloïse, happily settling herself on the edge of the bed. ‘Now run along downstairs, mother, if you don’t mind, because I want to kiss Bobby’

  ‘All right, I’ll go and see how Rosemary and Laetitia are getting on. Have a lovely time, and don’t be too long.’

  Shortly after this, Bobby himself came downstairs, and revolted by the sights and sounds of cheerlessness which greeted his eyes, thoughtfully turned out the electric light at the main, thus breaking up the party. By the flickering rays of the only candle that Compton Bobbin possessed, coats were found, adieux were said, and, grumbling to the last, the flower of Gloucestershire man and maidenhood climbed into their Morris Cowleys and drove away.

  This contretemps postponed but did not avert Lady Bobbin’s furious upbraiding of Bobby and Philadelphia, who, having disappeared at the first dance on the programme, had never been seen again mingling with their guests.

  ‘I know it’s all Louisa’s fault,’ she said angrily, ‘and I’m damned if I’ll go on having that woman to the house. I’m sick and tired of her rudeness, and as for that little – Héloïse, I’d much sooner neither of you had any more to do with her.’

  Paul and Philadelphia parted the next day with tears and promises of eternal fidelity. Their farewells were rendered slightly more bearable than they would otherwise have been by the fact that Aunt Loudie, having given them the only moral support they had as yet received, had promised that she would invite Philadelphia to stay in London as soon as she herself should return from Switzerland.

  ‘See you very soon, my darling,’ said Paul, as they stood on Woodford platform waiting for his train.

  ‘Yes, darling. And mind you write to me.’

  ‘Of course I will, every day. And mind you do, too. Take care of yourself, my precious, and don’t worry too much. Everything will come all right in the end, you’ll see.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Philadelphia, miserably.

  ‘Now come on,’ said Bobby impatiently as the train came to a standstill, jump in, Paul – goodbye, Delphie, come and see me at Eton some time, old girl. Don’t let them forget to send on my letters and parcels. Goodbye – goodbye.’

  To Philadelphia, left alone on the cold, wet and empty platform, it seemed as though all happiness had come to an end. She cried so much that she could hardly see to drive her car home.

  Paul and Bobby lounged luxuriously in their first-class carriage (it was one of Bobby’s talents that he could always travel first-class on a third-class ticket), and argued as to whether they should lunch at the Ritz or the Berkeley, and what film they should go to afterwards. At Oxford they got out and bought all the illustrated papers. Paul felt agreeably sentimental and wretched, but he was glad, on the whole, to be going back to London. The only drawback was that he had promised Philadelphia to look for work, a pastime that he detested, and worse still, to do work if he found it. Much would he have preferred to settle down in a desultory manner to his life of Lady Maria Bobbin. However, he put these unpleasant thoughts from him without any difficulty and was soon deep in perusal of The Tatler.

  Philadelphia wandered about Compton Bobbin like a lost soul. She could find no comf
ort in her situation. It was typical, she thought again, of the malignant spirit which apparently controlled her destiny to cram just one month of her life with fascinating people and events, only to remove them all in a single day, leaving in their place a few memories to make everything seem flatter, more dreary than before. Paul had gone, Sally and Walter had gone for ever, Amabelle would not, it appeared, be back before Easter – her plans for a country wedding had been altered; she now intended to get married quietly in London as soon as the lambing season should be over and go to her villa on the Riviera for the honeymoon.

  Philadelphia found herself once more without any occupation or interests, and for the rest of that day she sat before the fire in an arm-chair, assailed by the ghastly boredom only known to those who live in the country but have no love for country pursuits, and no intellectual resources on which they can fall back. And in the clutches of that boredom, too boring even to describe, she remained during the weeks to come. She would get up in the morning as late as she dared, and read the papers over and over again, hoping to pass the time until luncheon. In the afternoon she would go for a little walk, and when she came in from that would sit or wander aimlessly about the house, waiting for tea. After tea she would perhaps try to read some improving work suggested to her by Michael, or, more often, play canfield on the schoolroom table (if this comes out it means that he loves me and I shall marry him) until it was time to have her bath and change for dinner. The evenings were occupied with wireless, to which Lady Bobbin was devoted. And so the days dragged on, from one meal to the next. Poor Philadelphia hardly employed the best methods with which to fight depression, but it is difficult to know, under the circumstances, what else she could have done. Her education had not fitted her for study, and in any case, like most women, she was only really interested in personalities. When she received a letter from Paul it would colour a whole day, and she would spend hours reading, re-reading and answering it; but he wrote at the most irregular intervals. Like most people who write for a living he hated writing letters, and moreover seldom had any notepaper in his lodgings.