xxxxxx
B.
Tony found very little to occupy his time on Friday. His letters were all finished by ten o'clock. He went down to the farm but they had no business for him there. The duties which before had seemed so multifarious, now took up a very small part of his day; he had not realized how many hours he used to waste with Brenda. He watched John riding in the paddock. The boy clearly bore him ill will for their quarrel on Wednesday; when he applauded a jump, John said, “She usually does better than this.” Later, “When's mummy coming down?”
“Not till tomorrow.”
“Oh.”
“I've got to go over to Little Bayton this afternoon. Would you like to come too and perhaps we could see the kennels?”
John had for weeks past been praying for this expedition. “No, thank you,” he said. “I want to finish a picture I am painting.”
“You can do that any time.”
“I want to do it this afternoon.”
When Tony had left them Ben said, “Whatever made you speak to your dad like that for? You've been going on about seeing the kennels since Christmas.”
“Not with him,” said John.
“You ungrateful little bastard, that's a lousy way to speak of your dad.”
“And you ought not to say bastard or lousy in front of me, nanny says not.”
So Tony went over alone to Little Bayton where he had some business to discuss with Colonel Brink. He hoped they would asked him to stay on, but the Colonel and his wife were themselves going out to tea, so he drove back in the dusk to Hetton.
A thin mist lay breast high over the park; the turrets and battlements of the abbey stood grey and flat; the boiler man was hauling down the flag on the main tower.
“My poor Brenda, it's an appalling room,” said Mrs. Beaver.”
“Its not one we use a great deal,” said Tony very coldly.
“I should think not,” said the one they called Veronica. “I can't see much wrong with it,” said Polly, “except it's a bit mouldy.”
“You see,” Brenda explained, not looking at Tony. “What I thought was that I must have one habitable room downstairs. At present there's only the smoking room and the library. The drawing room is vast and quite out of the question. I thought what I needed was a small sitting room more or less to myself. Don't you think it has possibilities?”
“But, my angel, the shape's all wrong,” said Daisy. “And that chimney piece — what is it made of, pink granite, and all the plaster work and the dado. Everything's horrible. It's so dark.”
“I know exactly what Brenda wants,” said Mrs. Beaver more moderately. “I don't think it will be impossible. I must think about it. As Veronica says, the structure does rather limit one … you know I think the only thing to do would be to disregard it altogether and find some treatment so definite that it carried the room if you see what I mean … supposing we covered the walls with white chromium plating and had natural sheepskin carpet … I wonder if that would be running you in for more than you meant to spend.”
“I'd blow the whole thing sky-high,” said Veronica.
Tony left them to their discussion.
“D'you really want Mrs. Beaver to do up the morning room?”
“Not if you don't, sweet.”
“But can you imagine it — white chromium plating?”
“Oh, that was just an idea.”
Tony walked in and out between Mordred and Guinevere as he always did while they were dressing. “I say,” he said, returning with his waistcoat. “You aren't going away tomorrow too, are you?”
“Must.”
He went back to Mordred for his tie and bringing it to Brenda's room again, sat by her side at the dressing table to fasten it.
“By the way,” said Brenda, “what did you think about keeping on Grimshawe? — it seems rather a waste.”
“You used always to say you couldn't get on without her.”
“Yes, but now I'm living at the flat everything's so simple.”
“Living? Darling, you talk as though you had settled there for good.”
“D'you mind moving a second, sweet? I can't see properly.”
“Brenda, how long are you going on with this course of economics?”
“Me? I don't know.”
“But you must have some idea?”
“Oh it's surprising what a lot there is to learn … I was so backward when I started …”
“Brenda …”
“Now run and put on your coat. They'll all be down stairs waiting for us.”
That evening Polly and Mrs. Beaver played backgammon. Brenda and Veronica sat together on the sofa sewing and talking about their needlework; occasionally there were bursts of general conversation between the four women; they had the habit of lapsing into a jargon of their own which Tony did not understand; it was a thieves' slang, by which the syllables of each word were transposed. Tony sat just outside the circle, reading under another lamp.
That night when they went upstairs, the three guests came to sit in Brenda's room and talk to her while she went to bed. Tony could hear their low laughter through the dressing-room door. They had boiled water in an electric kettle and were drinking Sedobrol together.
Presently, still laughing, they left and Tony went into Brenda's room. It was in darkness, but hearing him come and seeing the square of light in the doorway, she turned on the little lamp by the bedside.
“Why, Tony,” she said.
She was lying on the dais with her head deep back in the pillows; her face was shining with the grease she used for cleaning it; one bare arm on the quilted eiderdown, left there from turning the switch. “Why, Tony,” she said, “I was almost asleep.”
“Very tired?”
“Mm.”
“Want to be left alone?”
“So tired … and I've just drunk a lot of that stuff of Polly's.”
“I see … well goodnight.”
“Goodnight … don't mind do you? … so tired.”
He crossed to the bed and kissed her; she lay quite still, with closed eyes. Then he turned out the light and went back to the dressing room.
“Lady Brenda not ill, I hope?”
“No, nothing serious, thank you very much. She gets rather done up in London, you know, during the week, and likes to take Sunday quietly.”
“And how are the great studies progressing?”
“Very well, I gather. She seems keen on it still.”
“Splendid. We shall all be coming to her soon to solve our economic problems. But I daresay you and John miss her?”
“Yes, we do rather.”
“Well please give her my kindest regards.”
“I will indeed. Thank you so much.”
Tony left the church porch and made his accustomed way to the hot houses; a gardenia for himself; four almost black carnations for the ladies. When he reached the room where they were sitting there was a burst of laughter. He paused on the threshold rather bewildered:
“Come in, darling, it isn't anything. It's only we had a bet on what coloured button-hole you'd be wearing and none of us won.”
They still giggled a little as they pinned on the flowers he had brought them; all except Mrs. Beaver who said, “Any time you are buying cuttings or seeds do get them through me. I've made quite a little business of it, perhaps you didn't know … all kinds of rather unusual flowers. I do everything like that for Sylvia Newport and all sorts of people.”
“You must talk to my head man about it.”
“Well to tell you the truth I have — this morning while you were in church. He seems quite to understand.”
They left early, so as to reach London in time for dinner. In the car Daisy said, “Golly what a house.”