‘Good evening, miss,’ he said, seeing Griselda’s long cloak. ‘Didn’t expect any of the guests to walk this far from the house.’ His voice was sombre.
‘Good evening,’ said Griselda.
He was leaning on a spade. He was elderly and enormous.
‘For her Highness’s dog.’ He indicated a pit he had dug. ‘The best place for ’im on the ’ole property. And if you listen you can ’ear ’em knocking up the little chap’s coffin.’
Through the still moonlight night came indeed a very distant hammering.
‘Poor little Fritzi,’ said Griselda. Louise was lurking indistinctly among the foliage.
‘Dunno about that, miss,’ said the Gravedigger. ‘Reckon ’e was ripe.’ Lifting his spade he plunged it up to the haft into the soft black earth. Though hideous, he was still hale in the extreme.
‘Good night,’ said Griselda, who found the subject distasteful.
Louise drew further into the bushes.
‘Goodnight, miss. I must get on with things.’ He was again digging rhythmically.
Louise rejoined Griselda as if she had been her shadow. The coffin makers appeared to be working somewhere in the Grove iself.
‘The policeman began it,’ said Louise. ‘Now the whole garden is polluted. Let’s get back as quickly as possible.’ She walked faster.
‘But before they came,’ said Griselda, ‘we were happy.’ She remembered her unforgettable dream of the night before.
Worse was upon them. As they left the Grove they saw that the vista up to the house was spotted with guests. Several of the long windows had been thrown open. Through them came a certain sound, not of music Griselda realized. The speeches were afoot and most of the guests had left the ballroom. It was incredible that it was not later and the speeches over. But then she had no idea how long they had been continuing, despite Mrs Hatch’s injunction of brevity. After all, she recollected, it was a turning point in history, and enthusiasm might well have carried the orators much beyond the dictates of deference to their hostess.
A man in evening dress seemed in hopeful spirit to be approaching the two lone women.
‘The cloak,’ said Louise brusquely. ‘I shall need it to get away in.’ Unbuttoning it, she had it off Griselda’s and about her own shoulders before Griselda could utter the enquiry of all lovers.
‘When shall I see you?’
The man in evening dress was near.
‘I’ll contrive. Bless you.’ On the words, Louise was gone. Her black figure flitted for a second in the moonlight and had vanished.
‘Good evening,’ said the man. ‘You look very romantic. Can we go further away from the sound of the human voice?’ He tried to take Griselda’s arm.
‘Thank you,’ said Griselda. ‘But I want to hear the speech.’
‘Then what are you doing out here?’ Frustration made his tone didactic and patronizing.
‘I felt faint and needed some air.’ No excuse could be too conventional for the commonplace creature.
‘Minnit’s hour-long pronouncement of his own righteousness had that effect upon many of us. His objective, you know, was to cut Leech out of his broadcasting time.’ Presumably the man now hoped to gain his end through general conversation. ‘Pretty low trick, don’t you think? Or are you perchance one of Minnit’s supporters?’ He smiled; and his tone again reminded Griselda of Stephenson’s remark that foremost in the character of every man is the schoolmaster.
‘No,’ said Griselda. ‘I have no politics. Will you please excuse me? I must go back to the house.’
He was so startled by the failure of his charms that, writing Griselda off as in some way peculiar, he did not even propose to escort her. Griselda could not feel that his observations boded well for the new coalition government. But possibly he was unrepresentative. Soon she would see. She crept in at the window through which she had joined Louise in the garden.
The scene was transformed. Most of the gilt chairs were ranged in irregular rows across the dance floor in front of the speakers’ platform. Though by no means all the chairs were occupied, many of the remaining audience were drooping packed together on their feet behind the backmost row. The emptiness of the chairs and the crowd standing behind them combined to make an effect of desolation. Many of the women looked bored. Many of the men looked aggressive. It was plain why Mrs Hatch had demanded brevity. Amplifiers had been lowered from the ceiling and every now and then emitted a resonant croak as the technicians dismantled the broadcasting aparatus, the end of the time allotted to the feature being long past. Each time the amplifiers croaked, Mr Leech stopped short in his flow of words and glowered momentarily upwards before resuming. Often this resulted in his losing the place in his notes.
Even without foreknowledge, it would have been obvious that the Prime Minister had been speaking for some time. His sparse colourless hair stood straight on end, his face was the colour of cheese, and he was thumping continuously when he had a hand free, in the effort to awake from slumber the long defunct interest of his auditory. ‘Time presses,’ he cried, ‘and the festivities offered by our splendid hostess will soon once more be calling us. We have already addressed you for far too long.’ Mr Leech, while one eye roamed from table-top to audience, glared momentarily with the other at Mr Minnit, who sat slumped forward upon the green baize, his head upon his arms. As with Lady Macbeth, it was impossible to deduce from Mr Minnit’s eyes whether he slept or waked. He was, Griselda realized, a man of very unusual appearance. ‘But,’ continued Mr Leech, ‘it would be improper indeed were I, for any reason whatever, to bring these remarks to an end before coming to the dire and daunting circumstances which have prompted me to begin them.’ This time Mr Leech did not thump, but it made little difference.
‘I have spoken,’ he continued, ‘of our great traditions, our unique heritage, of literature, art, and science, of our public school system, our mercantile genius, our sportsmanship, our village hostelries, our ancient monuments, Magna Carta, the noble City of London, the late terrible world conflict, our aircraft and balloons, our love of animals, and the faith we repose in our young folk. Shining through and igniting the whole splendidly coloured picture is one theme peculiar to our people alone: the theme of initial failure transmuted into ultimate success, immediate disaster into final victory.’ There was an unexpected burst of cheering. Not even the prevailing need for food could wholly deaden so conditioned a reflex.
‘And what has been the philosopher’s stone which has wrought the miracle? Always it has been one thing only: our readiness for sacrifice.’ Some of the older people nodded their agreement. ‘I venture to say before you all, that no other people has so often had demanded of it so many sacrifices. As page follows page of history we read the same story: the story of final ruin averted by ruinous sacrifice. And on too many of those pages we see that the writing was in sacrificial blood. Tonight it may appear that the need is less; not for blood, but for toil and taxes and toil again, to rebuild the sinews of greatness.’
But, if so, it appeared wrongly. For when Mr Leech came to these words, there was a flash and a detonation; and the ballroom momentarily took on the aspect of a battlefield. The Communists had contrived to throw a bomb.
A group of about a dozen classless figures had appeared from nowhere, screaming slogans and distributing leaflets. One of them even had a banner, bearing a highly coloured portrait of Engels on one side, and a quotation in German on the other (the article having been salvaged from a sympathetic foreign organization recently dissolved by the authorities).
Griselda, whose first political meeting this was, looked around terrified. Fortunately, however, there appeared to have been no loss of life, or even major injury, and what blood the historian could have drawn upon, had come mainly from noses. There was, however, a terrible smell of poor quality chemicals and burnt cardboard. The victims of the outrage were setting themselves and their chairs upon their feet, adjusting their garments and calling for redress. Those who had not been bowled over, were even more belligerent, having more available energy.