Parson's Nine

by Noel Streatfeild

  “Write on patriotism, Susanna.”

  Susanna would take a clean sheet of paper. Write “Patriotism” across the top in large letters. Underline it neatly. Scowl. Chew her pen. Beat the legs of her chair with her heels. Finally put down, “Patriotism is love of your country.” And there she would stick, until in desperation she pushed the paper across the table.

  “I’m sorry, Crossy, but that’s all I know.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, dear. You must have more to say than that. You can’t be trying.”

  Then the scowling, pen-chewing, and chair-beating would begin again, and go on for half an hour, until, time being up, Miss Crosby would take the paper, to find Susanna had added:

  “English people are especially patriotic, as they have so much to be proud of.”

  Miss Crosby, her dreams of producing a famous authoress melting, would be almost in tears.

  “But why is it, dear, that you can write quite beautifully on subjects about which I have taught you, but cannot say a word when I ask you to think out a subject for yourself? I am forced to think it is not a case of ‘can’t,’ but a case of ‘won’t.’”

  “Really it is that I can’t, Crossy dear. I feel such a fool writing down the things I think.”

  “But don’t you want to write? Think what it must have been like to have been one of those wonderful women whose lives you have read lately. Fancy knowing that with your pen you were being a real power in the world.”

  “I don’t think I’ll have time to write much; you see, I’m going to keep house for Baruch.”

  “But, Susanna, have you no ambition?”

  “I don’t think so, Crossy.”

  Catherine, looking at Judith, felt she was neglecting her duty. At seventeen the girl was half in and half out of the schoolroom. Sulky and discontented, she was throwing her energies, before devoted to lessons, into work in the parish. She didn’t like it, but it gave her a feeling of power, for as the Vicar’s daughter she carried some weight with her fellow-workers. Her life was full—but she was bored! bored! bored! This was mirrored in her face and in her appearance.

  “What’s it matter how I look?” she would say, shrugging her shoulders and scowling, if Catherine criticised her—“I’m a proper church puss, and look it. What more do you want?”

  “My goodness! I must do something about this,” said Catherine to herself. “She needs to know some men; admiring men.”

  It was no good looking for help from David, who was delighted with Judith, and had taken to calling her “My little right hand.” Catherine decided to explain her dilemma and plead for help from her father-in-law.

  Lord Bristone was fond of Catherine. He had clear views on what a woman should be like. She came very near his ideal.

  “Nice womanly woman. And dammit! she’s good-lookin’, too.”

  He had never got over his amazement that David could have succeeded in marrying anything so attractive—but explained it by:

  “Shows the boy has got a chip of the old block in him somewhere.”

  Catherine found the old man in his study, busy at his writing. He sat in his large leather armchair with his pile of foolscap on his knee, and his middle-morning glass of port with its accompanying ginger biscuits on a table beside him.

  Sims, showing Catherine in, whispered warningly:

  “His lordship’s a bit—tired this morning, Mrs. David, ma’am.”

  The old man half rose to greet his daughter-in-law.

  Catherine kissed him.

  “Don’t get up, Father.”

  “You’ll take a glass of wine, m’dear? Sims! Sims! Where is the man? Confound him!” The door opened, and Sims came in with another glass of port and the biscuit barrel. “Confound it, man! Where’s the decanter? Am I some wretched publican to offer a guest a mere glass?”

  Sims threw a worried eye in Catherine’s direction.

  “Well, m’Lord, I knew Mrs. David never took more than half a glass.”

  “Dammit, man! I don’t care if Mrs. David takes half a glass or ten glasses, I want the decanter.”

  “Well, m’Lord, it’s the doctor’s orders. He said, ‘Sims, if you care for your master, see he never touches more than one glass.’”

  “Did he? Did he? Damn his impertinence! I won’t be dictated to by the wretched fellow. Bring the decanter.”

  “Now, Father,” said Catherine softly, “don’t let’s keep Sims. I’ve come specially to see you because I’ve got something I want to talk to you about. I’ve got the half-glass, which is all I want, and you’ve got the whole glass, which is all you’re allowed.”

  “Yes, but dammit, m’dear—Very well, Sims, you can go. I’m feeling a bit annoyed this morning,” he apologised as the door closed. “I want to get this last volume written before I die, and I have half m’time wasted hearing complaints about m’sons. The place is fallin’ to bits, from all accounts. And all they think of is drink and women. Bless me! I sometimes think that psalm-singing milksop of yours is the best of the lot.”

  Catherine laid her hand silently on his. They sat like that for a minute saying nothing. Then he burst out:

  “What about your boys? Are they goin’ to be any good? Is that young Esdras going to be any use here? I doubt it.”

  “He’s young yet, Father. See what he’s like in a year or two.”

  “Year or two indeed! In a year or two I’ll be dead. Give me another biscuit.”

  “Father, I want your help.” Catherine plunged into her story, telling him fully of her anxiety. “What she needs, as you will understand, is a little attention paid to her to make her take an interest in her appearance. Will you help me, Father? When we are all here at Easter, would you give a little dance for her?”

  “A dance! A dance! Dammit, woman! There hasn’t been a ball in this house since m’wife died. Not but what the long gallery makes a fine ballroom. Beautiful floor. I remember a ball held there in—why, dammit! Must be fifty years ago.” He chuckled. “That was the ball when young Tony Carruthers and old Marsden’s daughter—”

  Catherine had to listen to the reminiscence and several more. But she didn’t mind, for the more the old man remembered of the silks, and fiddles, and laughter of the old days, the more he grew to the idea of giving a dance for Judith. Even before she left he had rung for Sims.

  “Sims, this Easter I’m givin’ a ball for m’eldest granddaughter, Miss Judith.”

  “A ball! M’Lord?”

  “Can’t you hear, man? Dammit! Are you deaf? Can’t I give a ball for m’granddaughter without you lookin’ as though the skies had fallen? I shall want the floor polished in the long gallery—and I must see old Crake about flowers; women like a lot of flowers about the place; and you’d better bring me a list of every bottle I’ve got in the cellar, and—” Catherine rose. “What, goin’, m’dear? But you must come back soon. There’s a lot to plan, a lot to discuss. Dammit! We don’t give a ball every day, do we, Sims?”

  Before they migrated to the Castle for the Easter holidays, Esdras had a talk with his mother. It was Good Friday. She had returned from the Three Hours Service, and was sitting with her embroidery in the drawing-room.

  “Mother, when I leave Oxford I’m going on the stage.”

  Catherine said nothing, but selected a strand of silk.

  “Mother, did you hear? Aren’t you surprised? Haven’t you anything to say?”

  “No; except don’t let your Grandfather know before Judith’s dance.”

  “But, Mother, you must have an opinion.”

  “Oh, lots, darling. I always have opinions, but I don’t often air them. It’s such a waste of time. You for instance, only want mine now, so that you can argue with me.”

  “What’ll Father say?”

  “Nothing much. But he’ll be very unhappy about it; he’s always hoped you’d be a parson.
”

  “Heaven forbid!”

  “I should think it probably would. It would be a most unsuitable arrangement.”

  Esdras sat down beside her, put his arm round her and hugged her.

  “Come on, Mother. What do you think? Don’t be so aloof.”

  Catherine smiled at him.

  “Well, frankly, I had hoped you might take an interest in the land. I thought perhaps you might have become a sort of estate agent to your Grandfather and some day inherited the place.”

  “Well, that’s a long way off, with Grandfather, two uncles and Father between me and it.”

  “I know. But that’s what I had planned for you. I don’t know anything about the stage except what I’ve read, and I expect that’s exaggerated—but I know it’s going to upset your Father.”

  “I’m sorry, Mother. I’ve been trying to know what I wanted. I couldn’t make up my mind. Everything I thought of was wrong, somehow. Then I did that bit of acting the other day—not too badly—and suddenly I knew it was what I wanted. The thing I do best. Understand?”

  “I think so, darling”

  The others were enormously intrigued by Esdras’s news. None of them had ever met an actor. It sounded a wild, adventurous life.

  “But what makes you think you’ll be any good at it?” Judith asked.

  “Because, little one, when your brilliant brother acted in that play last term everyone said: ‘The words of his mouth were sweeter than butter.’”

  “Trust you to find a bit of Bible about yourself,” said Judith bitterly. She retreated angrily to the garden. “What luck men have,” she muttered. “Esdras wants to do something awful, like go on the stage, and they’ll let him. But me, I only want a little thing like going to college, and I can’t have it because I’m a girl. And Mummy thinks a dance will make up! Oh, it is mean.”

  Esdras waited till Easter Day was over, then he went to David. He felt a cad. His father looked so white and miserable when he heard what he had to say, but he offered no opposition.

  “You are sure, my son, that this is what you want?”

  “Quite, Father.”

  “You’ve thought and prayed about it?”

  “Yes, I’ve thought a lot about it. You see—”

  “Well, I’ve no right to interfere with you. It’s not the life I should choose for you. But a God-fearing life can be led in any vocation. I will inquire into the best method of having you trained—bless you, old man.”

  Susanana pulled Baruch into her bedroom.

  “D’you know what Esdras is doing?”

  “No.”

  “He’s in the study talking to Daddy about going on the stage. Don’t you think as everybody’s talking about doing things, this would be a good minute to talk to Mummy about Canada?”

  “She’ll say we’re too young.”

  “’Course we’re too young to go, silly; we know that, but we aren’t too young to talk about it.”

  Baruch wavered.

  “Where is Mummy?”

  “Sewing in the drawing-room.”

  “All right, come on. Just wait till I get that book.”

  “Well, darlings?” said Catherine.

  Baruch lolled against the high back of her chair.

  “Mummy, Susanna and I want to go to Canada.”

  “Dear me! When?”

  “When we’re grown up.”

  “Suppose you tell me about it.”

  “Go on, Baruch, you tell.” Susanna curled up on the end of the sofa, hugging her knees.

  “It was because the term before last a man came to lecture about emigrating,” he explained. “I thought it sounded jolly nice, so this term I got a book about it out of the library, and I forgot to put it back so as I could bring it home, because I wanted Susanna to see it. Here it is.” He held out John Foster Fraser’s Canada As It Is. “A lot of it’s most awfully dull, all about towns, and how many people live in them, but most of it’s lovely. Listen, Mummy.” He opened the book at a marker. “It says here, ‘Every few miles in this wonderful land the song of the reaper was heard. Rarely, as we drove, did we meet anybody on the trail—not one man to thirty miles.’ And here: ‘The day is cloudless, the sky real blue, with no fleck of white in it. Distant objects, though reduced, are clear with crisp tangibility. Far off can be seen the long hut of a settler.’ ” He turned to Catherine, his eyes shining behind his glasses. “Oh, Mummy, doesn’t it sound lovely and empty?”

  Catherine looked up, but before she could speak he silenced her.

  “There’s just one more bit I want you to hear—the nicest bit of all: ‘The prairie is like a calm at sea.’ And look, here’s pictures.” Rapidly he turned over the pages, avoiding those pictures of people and towns, but lingering lovingly on those of the scenery. Then he shut the book.

  “Mummy, may we go?”

  Catherine didn’t answer for a moment, but went quietly on with her embroidery, thinking over Baruch’s words:

  “Doesn’t it sound lovely and empty?” Such an odd remark for a boy to make. Was he perhaps a little different?—queer? She raised her eyes. He looked very ordinary, his hair rumpled, his collar dirty. She smiled at him.

  “Yes, darling, if by the time you are grown up and have finished with school and Oxford you still want to go, I’m sure Daddy will let you. I’ll talk to him about it quite soon.”

  “But I don’t want to go to Oxford. I want to go as soon as I’ve left school.”

  “Well, that might be arranged; we’ll see what Daddy says.”

  “And me?” asked Susanna. “Can I go directly I’ve finished doing lessons?”

  “I’m afraid that’s out of the question. Canada for Baruch is one thing—he’s a boy—but I’m afraid Daddy would never dream of allowing you to go.”

  “I shall go in the end.” Susanna uncurled herself from off the sofa and came over to her mother. “I shall go as soon as I’m twenty-one. You can’t stop me.”

  Catherine laughed. Seeing her there, a thin slip with long legs, and swinging plaits, twenty-one seemed an immense way off.

  “Don’t be so stern with me. Perhaps—mind you, I only say ‘perhaps’—if there are sufficient pennies to spare by the time Baruch is old enough to go, you and I will go to Canada with him, to settle him in.”

  Susanna hopped eagerly up and down.

  “Don’t say ‘perhaps,’ Mummy, say ‘promise.’ ”

  “I can’t. ‘Promise’ is a very serious word. I mightn’t be able to keep it; anything might happen before then.”

  The twins ran out into the garden.

  “Oh, Baruch, isn’t that lovely? And Mummy might just as well have said ‘promise,’ because that’s what she meant. Nothing’s going to happen by then; why should it?”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Susanna, Baruch, Manasses and Maccabeus leaned over the stairs. Whispering, giggling, admiring, they watched the guests arrive for Judith’s ball. They had already decided their Mother looked “heavenly,” Judith “not bad,” and Esther, who was at the fat stage, “a perfect fright.” They had been embarrassingly loud-voiced in their admiration of Esdras’s and Tobit’s first “tails,” while calmly accepting the “tails” of their friends as a matter of course. They had commiserated with Sirach, condemned to childish “Etons.” They had felt the deepest sympathy with their Father, made conspicuous by his “dog collar,” and nervous lest he should bring shame on them all by insisting on saying grace before supper. They had hoped that their Grandfather would not notice that his evening clothes were not cut quite the same as his guests’.

  “There!” said Manasses, as the last arrivals hurried through the hall. “Now the thing is, will Sims remember?”

  The band struck up in the long gallery.

  “That’s ‘Destiny,’ ” observed Susanna. “We had it at dancing class.”
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  “Bags we have a dance of our own till Sims comes,” Manasses suggested. He seized Maccabeus round the waist, and, a little hampered by dressing-gowns and bedroom slippers, they revolved solemnly.

  “Come on, Sukey.” Baruch clutched his sister firmly. Counting carefully, they began to waltz.

  The dance came to an end.

  “Look,” whispered Susanna. “They’re all coming back into the hall. I wonder why.”

  “I expect they think the things to drink are out here.” Baruch hung perilously over the banisters. “I bet they soon twig they’re in the library.”

  “Look, they’re going to sit on the stairs,” Manasses pointed out. “Now you wouldn’t think grown-ups would sit on stairs at a party, would you?”

  “Oh, there’s Judith,” Maccabeus exclaimed, “and with quite an old man.”

  “Well, she’s not awfully pretty; perhaps only somebody’s father would dance with her,” Baruch suggested.

  “Oh, I don’t know; she looks nice tonight, I think,” said Susanna.

  “Not bad,” Baruch agreed, “but not like all these ladies.”

  “He looks sort of clever.” Susanna stared down at her sister’s partner. “Judith will like that.”

  A door opened behind them. The children hopped about with joy.

  “Good old Sims!”

  “I knew he wouldn’t forget.”

  “What’s he sent us?”

  The under-footman, with a grin, deposited the tray on the ground among them.

  “Meringues!”

  “And sandwiches and fruit salad!”

  “And a whole jug of lemonade!”

  “Oh, I say, thanks, Sims, most awfully!”