On the Brink of Tears

by Peter Rimmer

  When they all trooped into the long vaulted dining room, Genevieve had to smile. Her grandmother’s idea of a cold supper looked more like a medieval banquet. The long oak table, the wood black with age and three inches thick, was covered from one end to the other with silver dishes of food; a haunch of venison, legs of lamb, a side of beef, ducks, chickens and what looked like to Genevieve a whole suckling pig including the apple stuck in its mouth.

  There were silver boats with fresh mint sauce from the Manor’s boxed-in herb garden that always smelt of lavender in the summer, the box hedges retaining the smell; Mrs Mason’s bread sauce with onions and fresh herbs; homemade red currant jelly to go with the venison; plates of Mrs Mason’s cold stuffing; green salads in crystal bowls; open bottles of red wine that Genevieve knew had been opened for the wine to breathe from early in the morning. As Genevieve told her mother afterwards, there was enough food on the table to feed a small army, and enough wine to get them drunk.

  When everyone was seated, family, old friends, the two boys and two young girls who were going to play the violins, Lord St Clair said grace from his place at the head of the table, holding his wife’s hand on the one side, his eldest living son and heir on the other. Then one after the other down the table her uncles stood up, pushing back the old, carved, high-backed wooden chairs to give themselves room to carve the joints. Up and down the long table under the high roof of the hall there was banter and conversation, a scene perpetuated by the same family in the same hall for centuries. Plates were passed by the guests and each was filled by the carvers with not a servant in the hall.

  Lord St Clair poured his wife the first glass of wine, then filled his own crystal glass with the rich red liquid before giving the bottle to his son on his right. Everyone waited for the glasses to be filled up and down the table, the bottles passed using only the right hand like Genevieve had once seen in a film of army officers dining at night in India amidst the splendour of the British Raj.

  Unable to get up, her grandfather raised his glass, moving it to acknowledge everyone sitting at the table. The room fell silent except for the dogs that had slunk in under the table looking for a chance of pickings.

  “Ladies and gentlemen. The King.”

  Everyone in the room stood up, the full plates of food left waiting in front of them on the ancient table.

  “The King. God bless him.” The chorus of words rang out in perfect unison before everyone sat down and tucked into their food, smiling around in happy appreciation.

  “So what do you think of that?” said Genevieve to Tinus sitting next to her.

  “Perfect. But I want to cry. It’s his last supper isn’t it?”

  “Probably.” When she looked up the table, she found her grandfather smiling at her. From her seat, Genevieve made him a bow before lifting her glass in his direction.

  On the other side of Tinus, Celia was flirting with Genevieve’s Uncle Barnaby.

  “The food’s good,” said Tinus.

  “So is the company.”

  “You can say that again. Thank goodness this family does not make speeches.”

  “Probably why we have lasted so long.”

  In earlier days, Merlin had told his daughter, the family sat at a separate table on a raised dais. The smaller table, making the shape of a T, cut across the top of the longer table that extended the length of the hall. Everyone on the estate sat down to eat with the Lord of the Manor, those of lesser status sitting below the salt, then a precious commodity reserved for the family and important people visiting the estate. Somewhere in the family history, servants ate in the servants’ hall, the tenants in their own homes, the family and their guests at one long table. The raised dais was kept where it was for visiting minstrels and performers, the minstrels’ gallery high above the table left unused and forgotten up in the darkness, the brackets that once held the lighted faggots never lighted.

  The two young women, dressed in long black skirts and white shirts with short puffed sleeves, took their violins to the dais before the red wine took its full effects on the gathering. Everyone turned in their chairs to look in the girls’ direction. Silence fell, the dogs under the table looking out to see what was happening, ignored by the family and guests as they waited for the violins to play. Only Lord St Clair did not turn round until Merlin moved his chair to face the dais, his leg too painful to move. Mrs Mason, who was more family and friend than housekeeper, filled her glass.

  “Ludwig van Beethoven,” said Celia putting the bow to her strings, smiling at Fleur. “A medley of his late quartets arranged for two violins.”

  For ten minutes, the girls played while their audience tried to look wise and knowledgeable, the strange last works of Beethoven nothing like the grand sound of his concertos and symphonies. Surreptitiously some of the guests went back to sipping their wine, their stomachs so full their eyes were closing as their bodies fought to digest so much food.

  Celia raised her right hand, the bow pointing up at the ceiling, letting the last notes of Beethoven fade through the stone of the old house. Then again she smiled at Fleur and gave her a wink. Instantly their demure stances changed; the girls planted their feet apart, each stamping a foot as the bows joined the strings and an old English jig danced its notes down the hall, breaking the sombre mood in a second. With the sad last works of Beethoven gone, the smile came back to Lord St Clair’s face despite the pain of cancer breeding in his rotting leg. The music rollicked, the guests clapped, the atmosphere spun around with joy as the dogs came out barking from under the long table. At the end, Lord St Clair raised his right hand for silence.

  “In our midst is someone some of us know as my granddaughter, Merlin’s daughter, the story of which is not for tonight. She is recently back from America, from making a film she imagines we know little about, a fact that I tell her now is plainly wrong. Like all good fathers, Merlin had his spy who let us know what was going on through the year of her stay in America. You see, I have an American daughter-in-law, Freya, married to Robert, mother of Richard and, after Merlin, my heir. In America, Freya has many friends in the world of newspapers where she worked before marrying my son. One of those friends, Genevieve, told Freya in a letter that once in the film, deep in the glades of Sherwood Forest you sang ‘Greensleeves’ to Robin Hood and his Merry Men, a tune by some reports composed by King Henry the Eighth. Please rise, Maid Marian, and sing that song in the ancient hall of your ancestors. Then this old man must find his bed while the revelry goes on. Thank you, my family and friends. Thank you for a wonderful life. Both Miss Larson and Miss Brooks, I am told, were warned to learn a tune so old it is part of Merry England. Let the sounds of old England be heard again in my hall. If by some silly nonsense I should cry, believe them to be the sentimental tears of an old man among his friends.”

  “No one told me you could sing,” said Tinus.

  “No one told me either. The tune doesn’t go up and down the scales which made it easier.”

  As Genevieve walked half the length of the table to the dais, she wondered how much else was written to Aunt Freya in the letters. There would come a day when Tinus found out she was not the innocent girl he thought. She had a crooked smile on her face as she stepped up, the irony of her jealousy at Celia’s look at Tinus on the lawn so small in comparison to her blistering affair with Gregory L’Amour.

  As she sang the sweet words of ‘Greensleeves’ she watched both her grandfather and grandmother cry, both of them leaving the hall soon after she finished her song, not before her grandfather ordered everyone to stay, to drink and be merry, to dance the night away.

  As her grandparents left, the guests had stood and applauded the meal, the night, the life of a man. Then it was Genevieve’s turn to cry and look away.

  “Don’t be sad, Genevieve. My father has had a good life and that is what counts. We all have to die. Come dance a jig with your father. You have no idea how proud you have made me tonight.”

  “My sadness is just as mu
ch for not knowing him better. Why do some of the best parts of life slip through our fingers? Why do we only miss something so much when it is gone?”

  “I have found it is better not to think too much. In the trenches, we lived for the moment. The can of bully beef we were eating from the can with a spoon. A trench rat with sad, speculative eyes. A friend. You were part of his life, Genevieve. What else could you have given him? The only thing we can hold forever are our memories… They are very good violin players.”

  “If young girls in America looking like those two girls played jigs like that, they would make a fortune. There’s no money in playing classical music.”

  “Why don’t you tell them?”

  “We’d have to dress them better.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “You have to show it off in America when you are on the stage.”

  “There is a spare room in the flat if you don’t wish to live with your mother.”

  “Father, are you suggesting I live with you for the first time in my life?”

  “Until you decide your next step in life. Now, go and dance with your friend from Rhodesia. He’s been watching you while we danced.”

  “Are you sure he wasn’t looking at Celia?”

  “Quite sure.”

  “Dad, you are naive. You can never be sure of anything. You can only hope. What will you do with the Manor when you inherit?”

  “Leave it exactly as it is, unless the Germans have something else to say. Your Uncle Harry, as you like to call him, which he was when he married your Aunt Lucinda, is in charge of building eyes that can see further than the horizon. All along the south coast. Harry says the German bombers will fly across France and bomb our cities.”

  “Won’t the French have something to say to the Germans?”

  They had stopped dancing and moved to the safety of the old walls of the hall; an old Indian Army colonel who had been to school with her grandfather was showing the youngsters how a jig was performed in his day. The colonel was half drunk and a little dangerous, the others giving him space as they clapped his wild performance.

  “Not if Germany overruns France like the Rhineland.”

  “No one fought back in the Rhineland. I read the paper. They were all Germans in the Rhineland happy to reunite with Germany.”

  “Churchill says the French exhausted themselves at Verdun.”

  “How can an eye see over a horizon?”

  “Radar can, according to Harry. They are building a tower at Poling, just in from the coast from Littlehampton. The tower sends radar signals that bounce off metal aircraft telling the operator on a screen underground in a bunker how many aircraft are coming and where they are. The bunkers are to be connected to a Fighter Command communication centre with phone lines to the RAF squadrons at their stations around England. When every aircraft has been identified by radar units, the squadrons will be scrambled with full tanks of petrol to intercept enemy aircraft. Harry said in the war, during a dawn patrol, he often had to break off an engagement and return to his base for lack of fuel. Very often, they only intercepted Jerry at the end of the patrol. This way, if the Air Ministry get their way to build a string of radar stations up and down the south coast, the RAF can sit on the ground waiting for a German raid. The aircraft won’t be using up petrol and the pilots can rest. Harry says our problem won’t be building aircraft but training pilots. That the aircraft will be replaceable but not the pilots. During the last war, only one out of ten pilots came out alive… What’s the matter, Genevieve? You’ve gone white as a sheet.”

  “Tinus. He’s a pilot. Uncle Harry taught him to fly. He’s a member of the Oxford University Air Squadron. If there’s a war, Tinus will be in the thick of it. Why the hell did Uncle Harry teach him to fly?”

  “You’d better ask him. I too had asked Harry the same thing… Tinus is coming over to ask you to dance. Just look out for Colonel Jones. How can a man that old have so much energy? There won’t be a war, Genevieve.”

  “Then why is Uncle Harry building his eyes in the sky, which make no sense to me… Hello, Tinus. You want to dance? Your girlfriend plays a mean violin.”

  “She’s not my girlfriend. She’s Fleur’s best friend and Fleur goes out with Andre. Celia thinks I’m a kid. Let’s show them, Genevieve. Why are you looking at me like that? Your grandfather has a soft spot for you, do you know that? Will you excuse us, sir, if I dance with your daughter?”

  “Enjoy yourselves. Always enjoy yourselves while you can.”

  When they finished dancing, they went back to sit at their table places. Tinus pulled back the chair for Genevieve to sit down, pushing it in for her as she sat. She had a half-finished glass of wine she had toyed with all evening. Getting drunk or even tipsy in public was something Genevieve disliked; it was different for two people together on their own.

  “What’s the matter, Genevieve? You’re not saying a word.”

  “If there was another war in Europe you would stay in Africa, wouldn’t you?”

  “Whatever for? All the fun would be over here. Andre says he’s going to learn to fly so we can both join the RAF… Where are you going, Genevieve!”

  “To bed. Say goodnight for me, I’m tired.”

  “We’re leaving tomorrow after breakfast.”

  She kissed him on the cheek before fleeing the room. Only when she was safe inside the small dressing room next to her father’s bedroom did she cry, her imagination too strong to control herself anymore. First, the damn newsstands had told her. Now Uncle Harry.

  Later, she heard her father go to bed. Outside the open window the owls were hooting from the woods. In the middle of the night, Genevieve heard something bark, not knowing what it was; the sound was different from a dog. When the morning sun came up, she fell asleep exhausted. When she woke, it was after breakfast. Down on the driveway when she looked out of the window the black and green Morgans had gone. There was a note under her door.

  WELCOME HOME. LOVE FROM TINUS.

  With a broad smile on her face, Genevieve washed her face in the round bowl on the wooden stand having sloshed in water from the silver jug. Then she dressed and walked downstairs to see what was going on. In his note, Tinus had said he loved her even if he had not meant what he said. The boys and the two girls were coming to the premiere. She could wait. Only when she walked out onto the grass into a beautiful June morning did she remember Gregory L’Amour would be her partner at the premiere.

  “You look radiant,” said her grandfather, back on his wicker chair under the tree.

  She pecked him on the cheek before sitting down on the grass at his feet.

  “There isn’t going to be another war is there, Grandfather?”

  “Of course not. It’s what they call sabre-rattling to get what they want. Nobody ever wants war… We’ve changed our minds. Your grandmother and I are coming up to London for your premiere. We are staying with Barnaby, who is the closest to Leicester Square. My word, I haven’t been to London for more years than I can count. Do you see what you’ve done to me, Genevieve?”

  “That will be wonderful. Where is grandmother?”

  “In the kitchen, I expect. Supervising lunch with Mrs Mason. We’re having it out on the lawn on such a lovely day. Most of my guests did not come down to breakfast so they’ll be hungry by now. Whatever did you all do last night after I went to bed to stop people having their breakfast?”

  “Well, Colonel Jones did a jig on his own.”

  “Poor Larry. He still hasn’t come down from his room. When will he realise we aren’t young anymore? Oh, there he is. Do you know we went to school together? Larry, old chap. Come over here and talk with me and my granddaughter. She tells me you were up to tricks last night once my back was turned. Just as well those two girls with the violins have gone back to London. Genevieve will go and find a chair for you, Larry. I love talking about old times. I’m going to Genevieve’s film premiere in London.”

  By teatime, most of the weekend gues
ts had left. Uncle Harry had roared off on his motorcycle, half his face hidden by the goggles. He had told them he was going straight back to London to be at the Air Ministry first thing in the morning. There was no doubt her Uncle Harry took his job seriously. He was briefly to visit his wife on the low road to Corfe Castle where she was staying in the railway cottage where she was born. The chauffeur was to bring the children back in time for school.

  No one except Genevieve found it strange that Mrs Brigandshaw, not five miles away, had not made an appearance at Purbeck Manor with her children. Except from Uncle Harry, not once had Genevieve heard Tina’s name even mentioned.

  “Is Mrs Pringle as common as my mother?” she asked her father in the car when the Bentley, its hood down, was halfway to London, the slipstream surging over the windscreen, the car going faster than usual.

  “I can’t hear, Genevieve,” shouted her father over the noise of the rushing wind. Genevieve shouted her question again on the top of her voice.

  “I don’t know what you are talking about.”

  “Tina. Why wasn’t she at the supper?”

  “She was staying with her mother and father with the children. Harry said they would have wrecked the Manor had he let them loose.”

  “Was that the real reason?”

  “Probably not. Do we have to shout at each other anymore? Let sleeping dogs lie.”

  “Can I bring my mother down to the Manor to meet my grandparents?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because your mother would be embarrassed, uncomfortable, if not downright miserable, that’s why.”

  Even at speed on a short stretch of road, the two identical pairs of mismatched eyes glared at each other before Genevieve burst out laughing; with all the wine laid out, her mother would have fallen under the table. Even then the idea of her mother not being welcomed at the Manor rankled. There had been a bitter echo in her laughter that left her with a bad taste.