‘I say – thanks awfully,’ said Toby to the company at large, clearly embarrassed by Eunice’s compulsion to check that her own children had been given full measure, that Toby’s collection of cigarette cases and silk scarves and tie-pins was of comparable value to Benedict’s, that the scent spray she had herself received from her brother was exactly the same as Claire’s and Polly’s.
Nola, leaving her own presents in a careless heap on the hall table, her mind on her sculptor alone in his chilly flat eating his Christmas dinner of cold beans and pickled beef out of a tin, slipped away to inform him by letter that Christmas – as she had long had reason to know – was hell for lovers.
Benedict went into his study and closed the door.
‘Merry Christmas,’ said Toby, feeling the need to say something, giving Polly a resounding kiss under the mistletoe which caused her to swoon most endearingly into his arms, her lithe, boundlessly enthusiastic-body and long, silk-clad legs proving rather too much for his peace of mind.
‘Toby,’ said Eunice sharply, ‘take the boys outside and race them up the hill or something.’
‘It is time,’ said Miriam, happily pronouncing her traditional formula, ‘for the punch.’ The door bell rang.
‘Quickly, Charlesworth – the punch.’
And for the rest of the afternoon she served it with her own hands, Aaron’s recipe, no innocent brew but ‘a punch that had punch’as Aaron had always said, good claret, whisky, a bottle or two of champagne, the best fruit in season, no more lemonade than was needful, offered with hot mince pies, slices of Christmas cake and cheese to the upper echelon of Swanfield employees, the departmental managers, accountants, secretaries, who had all been required by Aaron to walk up the hill to High Meadows on Christmas afternoon, no doubt at great inconvenience to themselves, to drink a toast with their master.
Traditional ‘high tea’of raised pork pies, cold, ham and tongue and turkey, a baron of beef, pickles, salads, another mountain of hot mince pies, a chocolate log, more dark exceedingly alcoholic fruitcake was served at five, after which it was time to rest and change for the evening, when there would be more guests.
‘I feel sick,’ said Polly, walking into Claire’s room and flopping down on her bed.
‘I’m not surprised. You’ve eaten too much.’
‘So I have. What else is there to do? I just loathe Christmas Day.’
‘You liked getting your presents.’
‘Oh – that part’s all right. I took Nola’s lot as well. Why not? She just left them there, in the hall, so she obviously didn’t want them.’
‘So now you have two of everything – two scent sprays, two silk scarves, two pairs of gloves, two beaded evening bags.’
‘What’s wrong with that? I like having lots of things. I notice she didn’t leave the emerald ring Benedict gave her last night lying around. That’s on her hand, all safe and sound. Cost a fortune, I expect.’
‘Yes – I expect so.’
‘I’m going to have diamonds.’
‘Good.’
‘This time next year, Claire, if not sooner – a diamond like a pigeon’s egg and a wedding ring to go with it. I could have had the engagement ring today if I’d wanted.’
‘From Roger Timms?’
She nodded, curtly, dismissively – poor Roger – and stretched herself, flexing her muscles, holding her long arms in the air and turning her wrists this way and that, badly crumpling the blue chintz quilt and then, suddenly sitting bolt upright, her whole body bristling with dissatisfaction.
‘Do you know how many parties the boys have been asked to today?’
‘Which boys?’
‘All the boys, silly. Every single male of the species who’s old enough to leave his mother’s apron strings. Even Justin got a couple of invitations although Eunice, as you might expect, wouldn’t let him go. We have to sit at home and wait and look pretty, because there’s no shortage of us. But they can go where they please. And so what they’ve decided to do is go everywhere – sharing out their valuable time a little bit here, a little bit there, so that everybody gets at least one dance. What fun! That’s why mother wouldn’t give a ball this year – not enough guaranteed partners and not enough staff. You can’t imagine what it used to be like here on Christmas Eve when we had our dance – fairyland, that’s all. Heaven. Christmas 1913 when we had the last one – I was thirteen years old, the same age as the year, and too damned young to do anything about it but sit on the landing in my frilly nightgown and watch. But – well – I thought there’d be another one, you see, the year after, and the year after that – every year – and now I’m not sure-I just don’t think there ever will – not just like that. Hell – how I loathe Christmas Day. The Templetons are having a big party. I suppose you know that?’
‘No.’
‘What they call a dancing party, whatever that means.’
‘A ball, I suppose, without guaranteed partners and not enough staff.’
Polly made a face. ‘Clever, aren’t you. Mother just wouldn’t take the risk. But I suppose Mrs Templeton has to do something with all those gawky girls on her hands, Kay and Margot and Jane – and Sally. Mrs Timms has made Roger promise to call on his way here – to support Mrs Templeton in her efforts. If he stays more than half an hour he’ll have me to answer to.’
And she had no need to add her almost visible fear that Roy Kington might well stay there the whole evening.
‘Well,’ she said, getting up, flexing her long golden arms and legs once again, tossing her cropped golden hair, ‘I hate it – that’s all – dreary old Day – and the part I hate most of all is now when they all go off and shut themselves up in separate rooms. You can see the tobacco coming under Nola’s door. Mother’s fast asleep and snoring. Eunice and Toby are having a blazing row, or at least Eunice is because Toby won’t fight back, you know; wouldn’t hurt a fly, poor lamb. It’s about Justin, I suppose, who isn’t a bit sorry for what he’s done. Or about Simon who’s just longing to do the same. Or else about why can’t he buy her an emerald like Nola’s. Benedict’s gone out –’
‘Where!’ But Polly did not notice how sharply Claire had spoken.
‘Lord – how should I know? Just out. He probably hates Christmas Day as much as I do.’
Had he driven over to Thornwick? Alone? She refused to think about it, having no inclination whatsoever to face up to the sensations her suspicions might arouse. Yet, suddenly, in this hot and heavy place, she was caught unawares by an acute longing for Benedict’s beautiful, tranquil house which, when coupled by a sharp spasm of desire for the man himself, dealt her a telling blow. How foolish. How wrong. He had not spoken a dozen words to her all day and she, oppressed by the sheer weight of High Meadows, the silent presence of his children, the blue chintz bedroom, had had little to say to him. Now, the suspicion that, in order to escape that weight, that presence, and for his own particular pleasure on Christmas Day, he had taken another woman to Thornwick, did not surprise her. It seemed entirely possible, quite natural, only to be expected. It seemed exactly the kind of thing Benedict would do and had been doing for years.
It hurt.
She did not hurry downstairs, waiting until she had heard several cars come and go on the drive below her window before she put on her long black dress, her rope of pearl beads, rouged her lips and walked into the drawing room smoking a Turkish cigarette in an ebony holder, a woman without a care in the world, as anyone could see. Benedict was not there to see it. She had not expected him to be. Nor was Roy Kington, although Roger Timms had arrived looking heavy and amiable and just a little sheepish as if the flattery of the four Templeton girls made a pleasant change, now and again, from Polly’s scolding. Nola’s cousin, Arnold Crozier, was there too, up from the Crown where he had taken the Tangerine Suite for Christmas, having got out of the habit, since the war, of spending December in Cannes. ‘A poor old widower who needs cheering up a little’, according to Miriam, although she knew quite well about
the young ‘flappers’ who passed in and out of the Tangerine Suite door in such rapid succession; cheerful young things, scarcely identifiable one from the other, as tiny and blonde and feather-headed as his late wife had been sallow and stately and shrewd. Of course she knew. One simply did not talk about these things.
Arnold and Roger and Toby. Eunice, looking sick and feeling blinded by the headache which always followed a quarrel with her husband. Nola in a green sequined dress which, with the green turban around her head, gave her the air, if not the look, of a snake, a large emerald ring on her hand at which she glanced occasionally. Polly in scarlet silk, vivid, almost painfully beautiful, concealing, just beneath the golden skin, the careful nonchalance, a scared little girl who believed her youth to be ebbing away, Claire, who had lost her youth with Paul and did not even want it back again, trying not to wait for Benedict, not to look at Nola’s ring. Miriam, surrounded by her family as she had fully intended, sitting at the centre of her charmed circle yet quite alone in her perfect content. And, apart from that, a collection of second cousins, obscure uncles to whom something was due at Christmas, all of them with daughters, sisters, a generation of wallflowers who seemed resigned to sitting patiently together in quiet conversation; and a sprinkling of very young men – too young – sixteen and seventeen-year-olds who pestered Polly for mistletoe kisses boisterously, but with no less enthusiasm than some of their fathers.
Not that Polly had the least objection to kisses – nor to sex in general, recognizing how badly men wanted it. Although, being completely unaroused herself, she saw little point to it beyond the power it gave her. She enjoyed being kissed and tickled behind the ears and rumpled a little as one would play with a kitten. That, particularly when she had had a cocktail or two, was great fun, a game she would have loved to spin out for hours and hours had it not been for its alarming effect, after ten minutes or so, on her partners. Men wanted more. She understood that now, although she had been shocked to begin with, considerably scared the first time she had slipped out of the Crown to spend a cramped and frankly distasteful half-hour in the back seat of a parked car, having agreed to go out in the first place only because the girls with the shortest skirts, the most dashing hair-cuts, the ‘sophisticates’ all did so. She had to force herself the second time too. But, like cigarettes which had made her very sick to begin with, she had persevered, had soon acquired the habit, soon learned the rules which, in her case, were very simple. She would give what had to be given, as little as she could get away with, as much as seemed necessary, to prove her own sophistication or to avoid being labelled a prude, a cold fish, a poor sport, Heavens – one could never survive that. And, should the pressure become sufficiently great she was ready to go even further, to do anything in fact, and even pretend that she had done it before, so long as if it would not make her pregnant.
Contraception did not interest her. She still planned to be a virgin bride, with a dozen bridesmaids and a white satin train six yards long. But, having accepted that in these changing times her blue and gold looks alone would not hold the attention of a man, or at least not of the men she knew, unless they could also be touched, even Roger Timms was allowed to kiss her with open mouth and unbutton her blouse from time to time; while others had been rather more fortunate than that. But Roy Kington, hard young warrior whose appetite for battle had taken him straight to revolutionary Russia from France, had acquired more knowledge of her eager, golden body – without in any way awakening it – in one short, blunt half-hour than anyone else had managed after months of persuasion. And while he had been clutching her breasts and biting them and forcing her legs apart she had consoled herself for all the discomfort and embarrassment he had been causing her with the thought that, for the sake of all this nonsense – and not very nice nonsense either – he had left Sally Templeton puzzled and lonely, waiting for him with a dry martini at the Crown.
But he was at the Templetons now, she had no doubt, dancing with Sally who was desperate enough to give him anything in order to escape that household of women, a domineering elder sister who would never find a man, two others who had lost theirs in the war, a widowed mother and a pair of spinster aunts who would all need a great deal of looking after one day. She had once felt sorry for Sally. Now she condemned her to something far worse than death and damnation – eternal spinsterhood.
Naturally she did not herself intend to suffer that dire fate. ‘Roger,’ she said, ‘do light my cigarette.’ Yet each time an engine was heard on the drive, each time the gravel crunched under the weight of a man, her stomach lurched, as Claire’s did, her breath caught sharply and her ears strained – like Claire’s – her eyes darted to the doorway – as Claire’s did not – her impatience visible – Claire’s perfectly controlled – to be replaced, as visibly, by disappointment, peevishness, when the door opened to admit another middle-aged businessman, a cleric, a youth.
‘For God’s sake, Roger can’t you sit still – you’re crumpling my dress.’
Where was he? He had promised to come. She had promised to make it worth his while, knowing full well that their ideas of ‘worth’would not be the same. Yet she had been ready to promise anything in order to see him, tempt him, relying heavily on her belief – learned from her mother – that men most want what they cannot have.
Where was he? She heard another car, approaching at speed, driven as one might expect a wild young warrior to drive and leaping to her feet, causing Roger Timms to spill his drink, she ran out into the hall fleet-footed as a virgin huntress of ancient Arcady, calling out ‘We have company.’
It was Benedict.
‘Good evening,’ he said, looking at no one in particular.
‘Good evening, Benedict,’ a chorus of voices replied, not Claire’s, not Nola’s, who, in spirit, was in a cold Leeds-attic eating beans. Not Polly who, caught now under the mistletoe, stood like a stag at bay surrounded by a pack of boisterous puppies and a few ageing hounds clamouring for Christmas kisses.
‘It’s my turn, come on, Polly – be a sport. Oh, I say, Polly, give me another one.’
‘Leave me alone will you – all of you –’
‘You don’t mean that, Polly – does she chaps?’
And immediately there was a chorus of ‘Stop it, I like it.’
‘I’ve had enough,’ she struck out wildly, catching a young cousin a hefty blow across the head, pushing a much older gentleman, who should have known better, so that he stumbled against the Christmas tree, bringing down a shower of tinsel.
‘Let go of me – grinning bloody monkeys … Just leave me be-’
‘All right, Polly,’ Toby Hartwell, moving quickly to her side, put both arms around her, easing her slowly backwards so that no one could see the tears pouring down her face: away from her tormentors.
‘What is it, old girl? Got something in your eye? We’ll soon fix that.’
And deftly, being a man whose wife was very prone to sudden outbursts of weeping, he dried her eyes, telling her soothing nonsense all the while, calling her ‘pretty Polly’again, as everyone used to do when she had been a child.
‘Toby – I do love you.’
‘Well’, I hope so. You’ve always been my best girl. All right now, princess? Ready to go back and dazzle ‘em?’
‘What that girl needs,’ said Eunice, who had heard nothing beyond her sister’s use of ‘bloody’, a word she had never pronounced in her life, ‘is a good spanking.’
‘I think I may get rather drunk,’ said Nola who had heard nothing at all. ‘Claire – how about it?’
Smiling, Claire nodded.
‘It is time,’ said Miriam pleasantly, ‘for supper. Come children – there may even be surprises – and prizes – under the plates.’
Nola was carried to bed at two o’clock that morning in exactly the kind of stupor she had intended, Claire following a few moments later, too tired and rather too tipsy herself to grapple with what she ought to be feeling about sleeping in the room next to Bened
ict, and the suspicion that Miriam had placed her there deliberately to show her how easily and in how socially acceptable a manner even adultery might be managed. She decided, therefore, not to think about it at all, falling asleep so deeply that it seemed only a few moments before the maid brought her breakfast tray and a piece of information which promised her release from High Meadows earlier than she had expected. Miriam, it appeared, was unwell and would not be coming downstairs that morning. Going to her room to enquire Claire found her suffering from a slight cold and a great deal of fatigue, wanting sleep for once in her life rather more than company. No, she would probably not get up today. They must manage luncheon as best they could. Nola did not get up either. Christian and Conrad – God help them, thought Claire – had gone to spend the day with Eunice.
‘I’ll drive you home,’ said Benedict. ‘Parker’s not here.’ And before they had reached the main road he had slipped out of his role as Chairman of Swanfield Mills and, smoothly – almost imperceptibly taken up the part of cool, attractive stranger.
‘Have you half an hour to spare?’
She nodded and he drove up the hill away from town, quickly and quite dangerously, she supposed; considering the steepness of the road and its sharp corners, the thin layer of frost just covering the puddles so that they released showers of needle-fine ice to mark their way. The air was crisp and snow-scented, a streak of winter sun low in the sky, painting the clouds a soft rose-pearl tipped at their edges with pale gold. Below them the town was a black smudge in the valley bottom, nothing but the factory chimneys and the tip of one church spire breaking through the eternal pall of smoke.
Getting out of the car they stood for a moment at the top of the hill, a bare place with nothing to shelter from, nothing to disturb them but a bird rising suddenly from the bare field beyond, beating its charcoal wings for a moment against the pink-streaked sky.
‘Whatever your feelings might be about silver-topped scent sprays,’ he said, ‘perhaps you might prefer this.’ Quickly, to her initial embarrassment, her sudden flash of delight, her anxiety in case her cold fingers might drop the lovely things, he gave her, or rather tossed in her direction, a pair of antique earrings, clusters of amethysts, opals and pearls in an elaborate Victorian setting marvellously crafted like no others she had ever seen. And she was amazed and a little alarmed at her own exultation in the sure knowledge that although anyone, who had the money, could go into a jeweller’s and order an emerald ring, it had taken time and skill and taste to find jewels like these.
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