The New Countess

32

The New Countess

    “How are you coping, Midgey, dear?” asked Lettice cautiously.

    Reddening, the new Countess of Sleyven replied crossly: “As well as might be expected, I suppose! Does Maunsleigh appear to you to be falling down around our ears?”

    “What’s the matter, Midge?” said Lettice baldly.

    “Nothing. I suppose I have been naïve in the extreme,” replied Midge on an angry note.

    “Er—my dear, if you are cross that he is out and about the estates all day, I am afraid that is only to be expected. Men are like that.’

    “He is NOT like that!” she shouted. “He is not ‘MEN’!”

    Mrs Langford stared at her.

    “I beg your pardon,’” said Midge stiffly. “Jarvis is not neglecting me for the estates: nothing like it.”

    “Well, I own I am glad to hear it. I confess, now that the weather is warmer I scarcely get a glimpse of Charles from morn till night: if he is not out on our own lands he is over helping Simon Golightly,” she said with a sigh. Midge did not react in any way; Lettice added cautiously: “My dear, I have been married twice, you know. You could tell me anything. Is it—is it the physical side of marriage that—that perhaps is disturbing you—worrying you, dearest?”

    “No,” said Midge, going very red.

    “Midgey, I know it all may seem very strange at first and—and sometimes if a man is—well, is very passionate—”

    “No,” said Midge, smiling a little. “Not that. I mean, he—he understands everything. Um, before I tell him, usually. I mean, of course it was strange at first, but—um, no,” she said, biting her lip a little, “I can assure you there is nothing wrong, Letty.”

    Judging by the little smile she was obviously trying to hold back, Mrs Langford, though admitting to herself a certain astonishment, did not think there could be: no! “In that case, could you not tell me? It’s not that I wish to pry, Midge—”

    “No, of course you don’t. The thing is, I don’t know that I can explain. Um—when I’m with Jarvis, it is much easier, but he is honestly not neglecting me. He’s teaching me to ride: did you know?”

    Mrs Langford shook her head numbly.

    “Yes: he tried to put me up on a glossy thing from his stables, but that was pretty much of a disaster, so he has very kindly let me buy a little mare off Mr Jeffson; she is not much bigger than a pony, and I am learning to manage her quite well. So you see, when Jarvis rides out to inspect the zemindaree, I can accompany him!”

    “The—the what, Midge?”

    “Goodness, has Charles not taught you that? Zemindaree means the lands of the great land-owner. Zemindar being land-owner.”

    “Midge, people will think you very eccentric if you go around using his Indian expressions,” she murmured.

    “Oh?”

    Mrs Langford swallowed. It had not quite been a reproof: help!

    “Actually, I am only spending this afternoon with you because Jarvis thought we would like to be alone; usually we see the callers together,” revealed Midge.

    That rumour was true, then. “Yes,” said Mrs Langford weakly.

    “Um… I can’t explain exactly what the matter is, and I do love him deeply—more than ever,” she said with a blush. Lettice nodded and Midge explained glumly: “The thing is, it never stops.”

    “What doesn’t, dearest?” she faltered with a sinking heart.

    Midge waved a hand. “This. Everything.”

    “Maunsleigh?” said Lettice in a hollow voice.

    “That, too. But not only that. No—married life, I suppose. As I said,” she added grimly: “I suppose I have been hopelessly naïve. But at Bluebell Dell, even when we were all living there and life was at its busiest, there always seemed to be a little scrap of time in the day when I could just be me. Didn’t you find that?”

    “No,” said Lettice faintly.

    “Oh. Well, it didn’t have to be much; it might just be ten minutes leaning on the sty watching the pig, or while I was feeding the hens, or on less busy days just taking a walk, maybe to pick mushrooms. Did you truly never manage to find a minute, Letty?” she said looking at her with sort of sympathetic horror.

    “No—um—the thing is, I never felt like that! I mean, it—it did not appear to me that I needed anything but—but what I had, in order to be myself.”

    “You were not only content with your lot, you were content in the norm: I see,” said Midge on a grim note.

    “Midge, many women find adjusting to married life difficult. It is a big upheaval, and taking on the responsibilities of a household, regardless of its size, is a tie.”

    “I truly don’t think it’s that: after all, I have had the responsibility of Bluebell Dell.”

    “Perhaps you have just not yet settled down to a routine. Well—you know what I mean: found those little corners of the day that you might make quite your own, if—if that is what you need,” she ventured.

    Midge sighed. “I have tried. Take yesterday, for instance. We had it all arranged: we breakfasted together and then we went over the accounts for Hingle’s Farm together. That’s way over beyond Mr Cuthbertson’s house, I don’t suppose you know it. There haven’t been Hingles there for several generations and the current tenant is an elderly Mr Simons, whose grandson is virtually running the place for him. Mr Shelby thinks he may be defrauding both the old man and Maunsleigh, but from the look of the accounts Jarvis and I decided that he may just be incompetent. The ride is too long for me, so I did not accompany Jarvis over there. I made sure he took a packet of food, because there is no woman at Hingle’s Farm to give them a bite, and then I saw M. Fermour about the menus. He has been very depressed because of my lies about Jarvis’s India stomach requiring very plain roasts,” she said with a twinkle in her eye, “so we spent some time planning for next week’s dinner-party.” Lettice nodded numbly. “Expect some over-sauced monstrosities,” warned Midge. “Um—where was I? Oh, yes: then I had a look at Peggy Watts and sent her off to bed, she has a sty in her eye the size of an apple. Then I was going to see Mrs Fendlesham but Bates asked if he might have a word, so after some tactful skirmishing on his part we got down to planning the seating for the dinner-party.” She laughed suddenly. “He knows all the county gossip: I need never have worried about that side of things! Then I saw Mrs Fendlesham and we talked about the linen and the maids and so forth and about the new hangings for this room, a little. Then I was going to take a little stroll before luncheon, but Mr Crayshaw came and asked me to help him with one of his letters, and after that they rang the gong so we had to have it, or risk M. Fermour’s dissolving into tears. Then I did go outdoors but I had only taken about four strides before a sweating Frederick was at my side. Bates has told him off to accompany me, just until I am more used to finding my way around Maunsleigh. So we walked down to see how the new path Jarvis is making through the park to the northeast is coming along, and talked to the workmen, and so forth. When I came back Bates warned me extra-tactfully that afternoon callers might arrive, so I flew upstairs to change my gown, and two minute after I had come down again, Mrs Somerton and Lady Ventnor arrived. So that was that, really. Well, there might have been five minutes after that and before changing for dinner, there sometimes is, but yesterday was the dreadful day upon which Mrs Fendlesham decided to inspect the instruments in the music room. Don't ask me why, I think it was because of this abysmal dinner-party looming on the horizon,” she sighed. “Anyway, she came in nearly in tears just as I was meditating an escape to the shrubbery through the French windows, to confess that a mouse’s nest had been found in the harpsichord.”

    Lettice gulped.

    “It shows how long it is since anyone musical lived at Maunsleigh, doesn’t it?” remarked Midge detachedly. “So, as she was so upset—it reminded me of that time that Harbottle found that very dead jam tart in Timmy’s cupboard, actually—as she was so upset I thought I had better look at the damage, though what good either of us imagined that would do, I cannot say: I have no notion what the inside of a working harpsichord should look like.”

    “Presumably there shouldn’t be a mouse’s nest inside it,” said Mrs Langford faintly.

    “No, quite.”

    “Er—my dear, this was not in that horridly grand big yellow room, was it?”

    “No, the music room: sort of faded red. Why?”

    Mrs Langford sagged slightly. “We were here one evening when the Dean played the harpsichord in the yellow room.”

    “Goodness, Mrs Fendlesham would never let a mouse near a used harpsichord! But that side of the house has been shut up for years, you see. Which does not mean, of course, that she did not blame herself bitterly for not having everything in it inspected and dusted weekly. Both inside and out,” she said severely.

    “Yes,” said Mrs Langford limply. “I suppose it was not a particularly auspicious beginning with a new mistress.”

    “No. It took a long time to calm her down, and Jarvis had had his bath and changed, and by the time I scrambled into my dress I was terribly late for dinner, and wounded his feelings horribly by entirely forgetting to wear the pearls he gave me as a wedding gift, or any other jewels, for that matter. I don't think he noticed that I’d left my wedding ring off,”—Mrs Langford gave a horrified gasp—“but then, with Jarvis, it is not always easy to tell. Then of course we spent the whole evening together. And went upstairs together,” she finished with a smile.

    “Yes,” said Lettice limply. “Er—well, that was a bad day, dearest—”

    “No, Letty, it was typical,” said Midge heavily.

    “My dear, the servants are still getting used to you, and you are still getting used to them. You must give it time. And after all, you are the mistress of the house; if you do not care for the butler to send a footman out with you, tell him so, for goodness’ sake!”

    “His feelings would be hurt,” said Midge simply. “And I did get lost one day, and the household had a terrible panick.”

    Mrs Langford closed her eyes, wincing.

    “I’m beginning to understand why Jarvis has had such a terrible time getting the kitchens not to serve up over-sauced—” She broke off hurriedly as a footman came in. “What is it, John?”

    It was Mrs Patterson, the Misses Patterson, and Miss Cornwallis, apparently. Midge sighed but asked for them to be shown in, and ordered tea for ten minutes after that.

    When at long last the callers had departed, Lettice said feebly: “Dearest, you could always say you are not at home.”

    Midge replied with a groan: “Not yet. There are too many noses who consider themselves sufficiently out of joint already by not being asked to the wedding.”

    “Oh, help. Yes, I suppose so.”

    Midge nodded and pointed out: “You could take up your sewing again, I don't think there will be any more— Yes, John?”

    Begging her Ladyship’s pardon but Dumpkin had ate somethink ’orrible and sicked it up in Mr Bates’s pantry.

    Mrs Langford got up hurriedly. “Midgey, perhaps I had best go. This is a crisis, indeed!”

    “Stay there, Letty,” replied Midge with a sigh. “I won’t be long. The thing is, Dumpkin’s awful fawning has got round Bates entirely—is that not so, John?”

    Grinning sheepishly, the young footman conceded: “Yes, my Lady.”

    “So he lets him into his sacred pantry even though I have warned him that it is most unwise.”

    “Usual, animals don’t take to Mr Bates, Mrs Langford,” volunteered John suddenly.

    “No, exactly. So the creature has got him quite besotted. –I am coming directly, John.” She hurried out.

    Mrs Langford sank back limply into her seat and took up her stitchery. It was another little gown for Polly’s baby and she had got several inches round its hem, even though as she was doing hemstitch, and the fabric was very fine, it was a somewhat slow procedure, when Midge reappeared. Holding, though as the mistress of Maunsleigh she probably should not have been, a plate of small buns. And followed by John with, Mrs Langford was very glad to see, a fresh pot of hot water for the tea urn.

    “These are M. Fermour’s idea of tact: presented after I had successfully calmed Bates down,” explained Midge with a sigh, setting them on the tea-table. “Normally only the kitchen gets favoured with these delicious little buns—don’t you, John?’

    “Just plain baking, they are, my Lady,” he said, grinning sheepishly.

    “Yes. Thank you, John: run along.”

    John bowed very properly but there was a grin on his face as he disappeared.

    “Midgey, how old is that boy?” demanded Mrs Langford.

    “John? I am afraid he is only fifteen. Dreadful, is it not? Child labour. He is Frederick’s little brother, you see. He has almost no schooling and can barely write his name, but he knows an awful lot about the ways of a great house,” said Midge with a sigh. “Come on: these are warm, still: let’s eat them!”

    They duly embarked on the buns and, the Earl coming in when they were but halfway through them, were not afforded the opportunity for further private conversation that afternoon. Which, Mrs Langford considered doubtfully, thinking it over, was perhaps just as well.

    … “It sounds as if she’s settling in quite well,” said the Colonel, yawning, as she finished her report over the dinner-table.

    “In some ways: perhaps.”

    He looked at her sideways. “No problems on the—er—more matrimonial side?”

    “Well, no, it would appear not,” said Lettice, blushing in spite of herself.

    “I have to admit, I did think that once Jarvis— Well,” he said, coughing slightly, “he is a man of the world, my dear.”

    “So it would appear. But I did have some anxieties, I must admit, Charles. Ill-founded, I am very glad to say. But there is,” she said, frowning over it, “more to marriage than that.’

    “Mm, true… Though possibly not at this very early stage.”

    “If she were a little girl of Polly’s age I would agree with you, my dear; but she is not, on the one hand; and on the other she has become the mistress of a great house; and I think, however good his intentions may be, Lord Sleyven may well expect to her to—well, to be in complete control of the reins of the house immediately.”

    “Sounds as if she is,” said the Colonel, yawning again.

    “I think not, completely. And in spite of her declaration to the contrary on the day she agreed to the engagement, I rather think,” said Lettice shrewdly, “that she is making the mistake of trying to run it as if it were a larger version of Bluebell Dell.”

    The Colonel pulled his ear. “Aye… Well, she has a trick of making herself loved by her social inferiors, my dear, there is no doubt of that.”

    “That is not the point, Charles. She will wear herself out if she tries to deal with every small matter herself.”

    “I see what you mean: can’t delegate, hm? The fault of the over-conscientious officer: damned hard to deal with,” he said, yawning again.

    “Charles, what time did you go out this morning?” said Lettice heavily.

    “Eh? Oh: I beg your pardon, me dear. Well, it was rather early. Had to see Spiggin about his cow, so I took the opportunity to talk to Farley, over at Two Elms, while I was out that way. Then I had promised to drop in on young Simon, y’see, and he is thinking about pigs, so we eventually decided it could not hurt to ride over and talk to Lumley. Well, to him and McVeigh, naturally!”

    Lettice swallowed a sigh. “I see.”

    “Might have an early night,” he said, yawning yet again. “—Farley’s oats seem to be doing well; we might think about oats ourselves, perhaps.”

    Mrs Langford agreeing that oats might be a good thing for Kendlewood Place’s home farm, the Colonel enlarged on the topic over the dessert.

    When he was yawning over a brandy in the drawing-room, however, she returned to the earlier subject.

    “Well, it must be up to her to make time to be alone, if that is what she wants,” he pointed out.

    “Yes.”

    “She’ll settle down,” said the Colonel comfortably.

    “Ye-es… Charles, do you think it is natural?” said Mrs Langford in a low voice.

    “Eh?”

    “Well, they have been married scarce a month, and already she is—is pining to be alone!”

    “Uh—well, don’t ask me! You know her far better than I. Natural to her, I suppose,” he said, yawning once more. “And if Jarvis is hangin’ on her sleeve even to the extent of receivin’ callers with her, dare say she may wish for a bit of a breather. Well, what young duty-officer wants the Colonel breathin’ down his neck every minute of his day? Added to which, she’s been used to being pretty much her own mistress for years, hasn’t she?”

    “Er—well, yes… But I really must take exception to the expression ‘duty-officer’,” she said limply.

    “Eh? Oh. Well, thing is, unadulterated Jarvis can be damned hard to take.” He yawned. “Dare say they’ll sort it out: most couples do. Give them time.”

    “I did not get the impression that Midge finds his unadulterated company hard to take: quite the reverse. I think you have not been paying attention!” said Mrs Langford on a cross note.

    “Letty, it’s been scarce a month: they’re barely past the honeymoon stage; and I’ve been up since five!”

    “Very well, then, Charles; you had best get off to bed.”

    “Think I might,” he said, yawning again but not getting up.

    “The point is,” said Lettice crossly: “it’s all the other things—the ceaseless presence of all those Maunsleigh servants and the pettifogging little details which cram her day—which she is finding very hard to manage!”

    “Give it time,” he said in a bored voice.

    “Charles: go to bed,” said Lettice very firmly.

    “Added to which,” he said, standing up and yawning yet again, “dare say she may not have admitted it to you, but I should think she might find old Jarvis somewhat demanding—er—just at first, y’know.”

    “You have not listened to a word I have said! If you had seen the expression on her face when she spoke of him!”

    “Well, dare say you’re right,” said the Colonel, going over to the door. “Give them time.”

    Lettice took a very deep breath but before she could wither him, or tell him again to go to bed, he had gone.

    “Men!” she said crossly.

    Midge was sitting in the small yellow salon with her work, blessedly without callers, for once, when her husband came in and, kissing her cheek, dropped into the chair opposite hers with a sigh. “Well, the last of those damned slums at Jefford Slough is razed to the ground.”

    “Good,” said Midge. “And are the Piggotts and Harmons safely settled in the new cottages?”

    “They’re in them, yes. And safe enough. But as to whether they’re happy to be there—!” He shrugged.

    “No, well, persons of that class are most resistant to change.”

    “Especially when it is for the better, it seems. Well, yes, I know. It’s still damned annoying, however. Wastes time!” he said with a smothered laugh.

    “Yes. Shall I ring for tea?”

    “No, chota mem, ring for a chota peg, if you would be so good.”

    Midge duly rang and John brought in the decanters on a giant silver tray.

    “I suppose I need not ask, what is that?” said Midge heavily when the boy had gone and her husband was refreshing himself.

    “Eh? Oh, Bates will have dug it out from somewhere or another. Unless it was a wedding present?”

    “I don’t remember laboriously writing out a note of thanks for a silver thing the size of a field.”

    “No: added to which, it is scarcely in the modern taste. There is a coat of arms on it, by the by,” he noticed.

    “Yours?” she ventured dubiously.

    “No,” said Jarvis simply.

    Midge rolled her eyes, and got up. “This is a lion, couchant… well, crouching, at all events… Um, I don’t know that I dare to ask you this: do you—um—let me rephrase that. Um… It couldn’t be sort of royal, could it?”

    “It might be the thing that my cousin’s father won off Prinny at play, now I come to think of it,” said Jarvis in a bored voice. “Cousin Partridge will know.”

    Midge returned hurriedly to her seat. “I didn’t know that gentlemen played for large silver platters.”

    “I don’t think they do: what gave you the idea that His Majesty is a gentleman? No: sorry!” he said with a laugh. “The story goes that—if it is the thing—it was a piece of German baroque work, the arms being added later, which the then Earl coveted as a sort of companion-piece to—er—now, I am sorry to have to mention this, Midgey—to the font or bath which stands in the front hall.”

    “The punchbowl,” said Midge limply. “I see.”

    “Mm. And in that case, the platter is possibly making its appearance tonight as some sort of precursor to the main event of tomorrow’s dinner-party. Where, I have a feeling, it may be destined for a starring rôle.”

    “That is more than possible,” she recognized with a sigh. “Bates has that sort of devious mind.”

    “Which reminds me,” said Jarvis with a twinkle in his eye: “may I see the guest list?”

    “Yes. And the scheme for the seating,” said Midge glumly. “Just a moment, I have them here.” She retrieved them from the pretty little escritoire which Jarvis had caused to be put in the yellow salon for her.

    “Ah,” he said thoughtfully.

    Midge did not speak, but a mutinous scowl appeared on her round face.

    “Why Miss Humphreys?” he asked mildly.

    “Because it is my first dinner party at Maunsleigh,” said Midge through her teeth.

    “Ah.”

    There was a short silence.

    “Then, why not Mr Humphreys?”

    “I did ask him if he would like to be invited, but I knew he would not. His back gives him a lot of pain if he has to sit through a long-drawn-out dinner.”

    “I see,” he said mildly.

    “I have asked Letty and the Colonel; why should I not ask Miss Humphreys? She may talk to Letty and be perfectly comfortable!” said Midge fiercely.

    “She would certainly not be perfectly comfortable talking to Mrs Patterson or Miss Cornwallis,” he allowed.

    “You said we had to have them!” shouted Midge.

    “True. We could scarcely invite Leonard and the Bottomley-Pughs and not invite…” His voice trailed off.

    “Mrs Cumbridge is coming because I like her and we owe her a very great deal and if Katerina does not have a chaperone the cats will hiss in corners; and if you say one word, Jarvis, I will hit you with the stupid silver platter!”

    Jarvis was silent.

    “Well?” she cried.

    “I do not wish to be hit with the silver platter,” he explained meekly.

    “Added to which,” Midge added grimly, ignoring this, “it will be a poke in the eye for the Bishop’s horrible wife!”

    “Well, yes. Whose idea was it, to seat the old lady actually next to the Bishop?”

    “I admit it was mine, so you need not blame Bates!”

    “Midge, although I perfectly grasp that the whole of the neighbourhood will rejoice to hear that Mrs Bishop was forced to sit at table at Maunsleigh with Mrs Cumbridge, don’t you think that seating her next the Bishop is—er—not very kind?”

    “Mrs Cumbridge is equal to anything, you need not fear for her! Added to which, she will enjoy watching his wife squirm, you see. And I couldn't think of anybody except Colonel Langford or Captain Cornwallis to put her next who—um—”

    “Would treat her with complaisance: quite,” he said on a grim note.

    “Not that!” retorted Midge with terrific scorn.

    “What?”

    “At your board, I doubt that any of them would dare to look down his nose at her. And she, of course, is more than capable of dealing with the worst of them. Um—no, actually I couldn’t think of anyone who would not bore her to tears unless I put her next to you, and I quite realise that that would not do, so you need not give me that cold look. It’s a great pity that old Mr Wardle is not staying with the Ventnors at the moment.”

    “Er—mm,” he agreed weakly. “What cold look, if I may ask?”

    “That ‘on report’ look, Colonel, sir,” replied Midge tightly.

    “Old habits die hard, I suppose,” said Jarvis mildly. “You are not on report, actually.”

    “No? It most certainly feels like it.”

    “The guilty are said to flee where no man pursues,” he murmured.

    “Yes, I have committed the heinous crime of inviting Miss Humphreys and Mrs Cumbridge, two of the people in the district of whom I am fondest, to a party in your house!”

    “Midge, I think you must realize, if you will stop and think a little, that I did not mean to imply any such thing. I merely think that neither Miss Humphreys nor Mrs Cumbridge will enjoy the company of those whom we felt we had to invite to this damned burra-khana.”

    “Oh. It did not look like that.”

    Jarvis sighed. “Apparently not. I’m afraid I cannot help my face. I’m sorry.”

    Midge looked dubiously at her seating plan. “I thought that Mrs Somerton ought to be next Colonel Langford. Well, he is your friend, and you’ve got Mrs Patterson and Lady Ventnor.”

    “Mm. What about Charles’s other hand?”

    “Lady Judith. She likes him. It was hard to think what to do with her, because of her close relationship to you. Really, if one goes by rank she ought to be next you, but Bates agreed that that wouldn't do.”

    “No. Well, please spare my nerves by not exchanging her position and Mrs Cumbridge’s.”

    ‘There, you see!” said Midge crossly.

    “Mrs Somerton could well go next the Bishop,” he murmured.

    “Ye-es… I’ve put him at Lady Ventnor’s other side, though. Well, the thing is, Jarvis, he had to be at some remove from the Dean!”

    “Er—yes. My dear, I hate to say it, but there is a certain argument for placing the Bishop next yourself.”

    “Bates thought so, too. But I’m very sorry; I just couldn’t. Not the first time.”

    “No, well, that’s understandable. But isn’t awarding yourself your niece’s papa-in-law rank favouritism?”

    “I thought it was nepotism?” replied Midge simply.

    Jarvis smiled. “Well, yes!”

    “I have put Sir William Ventnor on my other side,” Midge excused herself. “—What are you wincing for?’

    “I have excellent eyesight.”

    “I know,” she said in a puzzled voice.

    “It appears I am to be afforded the delightful spectacle of Ventnor squinting down your bodice for the entirely of this burra-khana,” he said mildly.

    Midge gulped. “It cannot be helped.”

    “No; and it is true that Patterson or Somerton would be nigh as bad. Well, on the whole, my dear, I think you have not done too badly. But the Bishop’s wife’s nose will be horribly out of joint.”

    “I don’t care: because,” said Midge gleefully, unable to stop the smile: “Arthur has got Little Jefford!”

    “Huzza!” said Jarvis with a laugh.

    “Yes: it is all signed, sealed and delivered. They will not move until Baby has come, Letty thinks it will be too much of an upheaval, and then, the house needs a lot done to it. Old Mr Hendricks is not dead, he was persuaded to retire: two of his sisters descended on him in force. Well, he was not capable of carrying out his parish duties, and the sisters will make him comfortable in their house: they are widows, they live in Bath. Have you ever been there?”

    “Er—yes. I have visited there briefly. It’s a very pleasant town.”

    “Oh, good,” said the Countess cheerfully. “Colonel Langford said it was crammed full of sakht burra mems and apkee-wastees, but that was on a day on which the wind was in the east and his shoulder was nagging him. –Isn’t it fortunate that you decided to go ahead with the new road through the park to the northeast, it will make the most convenient short-cut to Little Jefford!”

    “Indeed,” he agreed gravely.

    Since Mrs Golightly’s baby was due so soon, she had not attended her aunt’s first dinner-party: Miss Amanda, Miss Lattersby and Miss Somerton, in Mrs Somerton’s barouche and escorted by Mrs Somerton’s footman, drove over to Nettleford express to tell her all about it. Possibly Mrs Somerton should have accompanied these unwed young ladies, but although she might have spent the time they were closeted with Polly in doing some shopping in the town, the vivid picture that sprang to her mind of the quality and content of the conversation on the journey outweighed for once her somewhat rigid sense of the proprieties.

    “Violet?” echoed Polly doubtfully.

    Lacey nodded hard. “She looked wonderful, Polly!”

    “Almost regal, indeed,” agreed Amanda.

    “Countessly!” corrected Janey with a loud giggle.

    “Be quiet, Janey,” ordered Lacey firmly. “There was nothing to joke at, at all. The gown became her fully as much as that black silk with the pale pink ribbons that you and Miss Humphreys had made up for her, Polly, dearest. It was a very deep violet taffety, the very latest cut, of course, showing the tips of her shoulders, and full puffs to the sleeves. Her skin looked…” She waved her hand. “Indescribable!”

    “It glowed,” said Amanda firmly, and for once succinctly.

    “Yes,” agreed Lacey with a sigh. “I do wish I were not so yellow!”

    “Low-cut, was it?” asked Polly.

    “Yes, but not, of course, outrageous!” said Amanda hurriedly. “Dear Miss Bur— Lady Sleyven, I should say!—would not wear anything that was not entirely comme il faut!”

    “Have you ever seen her in her old black wool with Mamma’s old print made into a petticoat under it?” asked Polly in a tone of friendly enquiry. To her gratification, Lacey and Janey immediately collapsed in ecstatic giggles.

    “I meant, at a public function,” said Amanda with huge dignity. “It was in the most exquisite taste.”

    “Yes it was, actually,” admitted Janey, blowing her nose. “Delightfully plain: it certainly made most of the other ladies’ gowns look overdone.”

    “What jewels did she wear?” asked Polly eagerly. “Oh—amethysts, I suppose?”

    “Trumpery, my dear!” said Lacey with a loud laugh, collapsing in renewed paroxysms.

    “What?” asked Polly limply.

    “After dinner, once the older ladies were gossiping safely together, she drew us aside and told us,” explained Janey with relish, “that she had tried to put on those amethysts he gave her last month,”—the girls all nodded—“thinking they must be appropriately Wyntonly countessly with violet—”

    “Her very words!” squeaked Amanda.

    “I am sure,” agreed Polly, eyes twinkling. “Go on, Janey.”

    “But then he came into her room and said they were trumpery things. And ordered her to wear the Wynton diamonds!”

    “Not the emerald and diamond set?” said Polly dubiously.

    “No, no, my dear: that is the Wynton set! These are the Wynton diamonds, merely.”

    Polly gulped in spite of herself.

    “Janey tells us they are of the finest quality.” offered Lacey.

    “Mm: blue-white stones of the first water. He has had them re-set for her. Not a remarkably quick process, even if it is done at the order of a belted earl, so he must have sent them to the jeweller quite some months since. Counting one’s chickens comes to mind,” said Janey, rolling her eyes horribly.

    “Black Maunsleigh chickens, of course,” returned Mrs Golightly affably, and the entire company, Polly herself included, collapsed in ecstatic hysterics.

    … “She did manage very well, we thought,” explained Lacey over the teacups.

    “As far as we could tell from our humble positions,” explained Janey.

    “Whom were you next?” asked Mrs Golightly eagerly.

    Amanda, it transpired, had had Peter Lattersby to her right and Simon Golightly to her left (a pout here appeared on her fair, rounded countenance), while Portia was at Mr Golightly’s other hand, with Vaughan Bottomley-Pugh to her left. Janey had been at her cousin’s other side, with Major Renwick at her right. Polly here eyed her cautiously, but she appeared indifferent. Lacey had been on Major Renwick’s other side, with Jonathon Crayshaw to her right. The which did not appear wholly to have displeased her: Polly wondered with a sinking feeling whether Mrs Somerton was aware of that.

    “Some might have said we were strung out like pigeons on a ridge-pole,” noted Miss Lattersby.

    “Yes, but it would have been much worse if some of us had been on the other side of the table. It was huge, Polly,” explained Lacey, “and laden with giant epergnes and candelabra and bowls of flowers and fruit.”

    “Fruit? At this time of the year?” she said limply.

    Lacey shrugged. “It was Maunsleigh, my love: apparently everything is possible.”

    Polly smiled weakly. “And what did you do after dinner, once the gentlemen came back?”

    “We did not do anything, thank God,” said Janey frankly. “Dearest Miss Bur— I shall never get used to calling her Lady Sleyven! Dearest Lady Sleyven is by far too kind-natured, not to say possessed of far too much good sense, to require anything of those here present, at a Maunsleigh after-dinner scene.”

    “You must have done something!”

    “We sat and listened, mainly,” explained Lacey hurriedly.

    “There was a most delightful instrument: the finest tone, my dear, and in the most perfect tune. We were in a very large withdrawing-room, impressively grand, with yellow brocade hangings and the most significantly massy marble pillars,” elaborated Amanda. “Though I for one did not find that the brocaded chairs and sofas—all in the most ornate and stately taste, and said to have been chosen for that very room by the great Sir John Vanbrugh himself—were wholly comfortable.”

    “Hard as boards!” agreed Lacey, smiling. “And of course all very deep, in the fashion of the last century, to allow for those giant skirts and hoops and so forth. Some of the older ladies looked very uncomfortable, and after a little old Mrs Cumbridge asked Miss B— Lady Sleyven quietly if cushions might be brought in: and a positive retinue of footmen brought them, all different colours, she must have told them to scour the house for all available cushions! It upset the colour scheme of the room horridly, though I for one found nothing at which to object in that; the pillars to which Amanda refers are a veined red marble, they look sort of diseased: quite hideous, and interrupt one’s view of the room to a quantifiable degree!” She laughed.

    “Yes, but the total effect is so impressively grand,” objected Amanda.

    “Grandiose, she means,” said Janey on a sour note.

    “I should think so!” agreed Polly. “But my dears; what did you listen to? Who played? Or did someone sing?”

    “The Miss Pattersons played and sang,” said Lacey heavily.

    “Urged thereto by their mamma,” explained Janey. “Your aunt asked them, very kindly, you know, saying that she would quite understand if they did not care to, as it was such a large gathering. Whereupon Mrs P. leapt upon them and dragged their protesting bodies to the instrument.”

    “Poor things!” shuddered Amanda. “The company was not merely large, but so select; and quite a number of senior gentlemen, of course.”

    “Plus Mrs Cunningham, her daughter-in-law Lady Paula, and the Bishop’s wife, to name only fourteen,” noted Janey.

    Amanda gave a stifled giggle, but nodded feelingly.

    “Oh, and your mamma-in-law, Polly,” added Janey.

    “Mamma-in-law is not musical: she would neither notice nor care if the poor girls made the most frightful hash of it,” returned Polly.

    “Well, they did not, it was quite respectable; but though I have no ear myself, I could not but think it was uninspired,” said Janey frankly.

    “Indeed. Although one must respect them for performing at all in such august company, for myself I felt the result lacked something of that spontaneity and freshness which your true artiste will achieve,” sighed Amanda.

    “Amanda is quite musical, you know,” said Janey, smiling at her. “She is too modest to say so, but we discovered when she was in London that she has perfect pitch. Papa has, too: they were chatting one day, and it was then we realised, was it not, Amanda?”

    Very pink but smiling, Amanda nodded hard.

    “That is why she generally appears to be suffering suppressed agonies when the choir sings in her papa’s church,” explained Janey sunnily.

    Poor Amanda choked, what time Lacey dissolved in giggles.

    “Of course: you would hear all the wrong notes!” said Polly, twinkling at her. “And did anyone else perform, Amanda?”

    “Oh, yes: it was truly awe-inspiring, dear Polly: your papa-in-law played the harpsichord most exquisitely!”

    “And given his position, no-one tried to talk through it,” noted Janey drily.

    “Not even the Bishop’s wife!” squeaked Amanda, with a sudden loud giggle.

    “Lady Sleyven put old Mrs Cumbridge next the Bishop at dinner, Polly!” burst out Lacey, “and you never saw anything like the look on the old cat’s face when she saw it!”

    Forthwith the whole company dissolved in helpless hysterics of the most painful kind.

    “Aunt Cumbridge enjoyed herself,” allowed Mr Bottomley-Pugh.

    Mrs Newbiggin choked, and had to bang herself on her substantial chest in order to recover.

    “She was next to the Bishop!” burst out Vaughan.

    Mrs Newbiggin dropped a small sandwich on the ornate Turkey carpet of the Nettleford House red salon.

    “Our theory is,” explained Vaughan, kindly picking it up, “that Miss Burd—um, the Countess, did it on purpose.”

    “I’ll be bound!” she gasped, going into a prolonged wheezing fit.

    “The food was good,” allowed Mr Vaughan judiciously, politely handing her the plate of sandwiches, when she’d recovered.

    “Fancy, were it?” she said, taking one.

    “Ar. We thought that feller we’ve got in the kitchen ’ere served up over-sauced fancy muck, but I have to admit it, ’e can’t hold a candle to the Maunsleigh cook,” said Mr Bottomley-Pugh.

    “Chef, Pa!”

    “Something loike that. Now, you may say it ain’t the season for goose—”

    “I moight that!” she agreed.

    “Ar. They ’ad it, though. Not too bad: would have been a youngish bird, left over from Christmas, I suppose. Roast, it were, served up with a woine gravy—weren’t too bad, but them vegetables were roight-down odd.”

    “Mushrooms and things,” said Mr Vaughan vaguely. “But the lamb was good, Pa!”

    His parent gave him a look of disfavour. “Maybe it was where you were sitting, but I never got a sniff of that noice-looking roast. –Collops, or some such, Mrs Newbiggin: swimming in a whoite sauce with itty-bitty pieces of vegetable in it. The lady what I was next to, she said it were à l’anglaise.” He sniffed.

    “That means in the English fashion,” explained Vaughan. “In French,” he explained.

    Mrs Newbiggin went into another spluttering fit.

    “There were some great pies, though,” he allowed. “And we lost count of the side dishes. I had a thing with kidneys in it: it wasn't bad. But then I tried a little tart, it looked all right, but it was revolting.”

    “What was in it, lovey?”

    “Meat of some sort, I think,” he said dubiously. “The sauce was sort of cheesy.”

    “Land save us,” she said mildly. “And was there soup?”

    Mr Vaughan began to tell over the soups on his fingers. Mrs Newbiggin gave a gasp of horror as it was revealed that one of them had been of fresh early peas. Which must have been produced in the Maunsleigh forcing-houses, for her own peas were only in flower and for certain-sure the hasteds were not for sale yet in town!

    “It were tasty, I’ll admit that,” admitted Mr Bottomley-Pugh. “Had a bit of body to it, but very delicate in flavour.”

    “No, aren’t you thinking of the watercress soup, Pa?”

    “No, yer noddy,” he said tolerantly. “The puddings were good, no argument there.”

    “I thought the pastry was a bit heavy,” objected Vaughan. “There were creams and jellies and floating islands, and blancmangers like you never saw: great towers, all of them smothered in little ornaments and dollops of cream and sprinkled with comfits or chocolate slivers or cashoos! And huge great piles of puffs, filled with cream and decorated with chocolate icing and candied violets!”

    “Maggie did try to do them blancmanger towers, bless ’er,” allowed Mr Bottomley-Pugh, “but they weren’t nothing to these things. I dare say each one was fully three foot high. All pastel-coloured.”

    “There weren’t any ices, though,” revealed Vaughan sadly.

    “Dare say they wouldn’t have them until summer,” said Mrs Newbiggin kindly. “Well, and who did you sit by, Vaughan, lad?”

    “Me? Um—Miss Portia Waldgrave and a lady I didn't know.”

    Mrs Newbiggin looked at him expectantly.

    “That’s all you’ll get out of him on that one,” explained his sire kindly.

    Choking slightly, she said: “So did it go off all roight, then?”

    “I won’t say, in terms of what, Mrs Newbiggin, given that poor Lady Sleyven had Sir William Ventnor to one side of her, and given that Mrs Bishop’s nose was as out of joint as a human nose could be without actually having to be put in a splint,”—Mrs Newbiggin choked in spite of herself—“but I will say that there weren’t no visible mishaps and everybody behaved themselves. The Dean played the harpsichord: that was good.”

    “Yes,” agreed Vaughan simply.

    “They say he's very musical. Plays the organ better nor the cathedral organist,” she noted. “And what about Katerina, bless her? Was they all koind to ’er?”

    “Ar. Within their loights,” allowed her father, scratching his chins.

    “Pa! Miss Burden had her come and sit beside her and talked to her for ages!” cried Vaughan.

    “Not ’er, yer noddy. And do troy to call her Lady Sleyven,” he said heavily. “Well, the Pattersons was all kindly condescending to all of us, Kate included. Except for little Miss Rosalind, she actually looked as if she moight like to be friends, only with ’er mother’s eye on ’er, didn’t manage nothing. And Mrs Langford asked us all over to Kendlewood Place, including Aunt Cumbridge, what’s more. Though whether Lady Sleyven asked her to ask us, I wouldn’t like to say. Lady Ventnor was even more condescending, but less kindly, if you get my drift. Mrs Somerton loikewoise: though she do seem to loike Kate.”

    “What about Mrs Cunningham?” she asked avidly.

    Mr Bottomley-Pugh scratched his chins very slowly. “I think she noticed we were there.”

    Mrs Newbiggin choked but nodded, adding: “If her or that Lady Paula C. had their noses any hoigher in the air they’d trip theirselves. Don't s’pose little Polly Golightly was there?”

    “No, the baby’s almost due,” said Vaughan simply.

    She looked at him with some amusement, not unmixed with affection, but said merely: “Ar, that's roight.”

    … “He’s not a bad lad,” admitted his progenitor, as he saw Mrs Newbiggin into her carriage.

    “’Course he ain’t, Joe Bottomley!” she returned forcefully. “’Ere, ’oo was that lady, really, what was next ’im at dinner?”

    “You know as much as we do,” he said solemnly.

    “Truly? Well, drat. Don’t think much of that Miss Portia. Bit of a little cat. Too old for him, too. Miss Amanda’s the best of that bunch, and they tell me that she’s got a London feller what her ma won’t let her have.”

    “That’s roight,” he said drily. “Little Janey’s cousin: the family we stayed with in London. When we went up to see the animals in the Royal Enclosure,” he said, winking. “Trade they moight be: jewellers and goldsmiths, Mrs Newbiggin; but the London shop’s in the best part of town—they deals with all the nobs; and three branches, and they’re thinking of expanding on top of that.”

    “She’d be mad not to grab ’im for the girl!” she gasped.

    “Ar, well, that’s gentry for you. –Talking of which, young Janey ignored that Major Renwick feller all through dinner.”

    “Girls,” she said, shaking her head. “Sometoimes I’m glad we only had boys, and that’s a fact!”

    “Though they can be a worry, too.”

    Mrs Newbiggin looked at him anxiously, but he added: “A feller gets to worrying, when ’is son and heir don’t even think to ask the lady next ’im at a grand dinner what her name is.”

    Laughing very much and informing he was a one, Mrs Newbiggin at that took her departure.

   Mr Bottomley-Pugh hurried back inside, for there was a brisk wind. Once there, he went into his study and looked somewhat sourly at a long, long list of names. Captain Cornwallis’s relatives were insisting on Nettleford Cathedral for the wedding. Most unfortunately, the bride’s side had no right of veto over the names suggested by the groom’s side.

    After some time he sighed and said to himself: “Well, never moind. Them as has got daughters will have their noses put properly out of joint by my Kate’s marrying a nob and being the most beautiful broide what’s set foot in the joint this twenty year and more; and them as haven’t will just have their noses put out of joint plain and simple.”

    He looked at the list again, and hesitated; then, his wide face perfectly expressionless, he picked up his pen, dipped it in the standish, and added two names to the bride’s side’s list.

    The names were “Mr Sidney Bottomley” and “Mr Harold Hartington.” Mr Bottomley-Pugh, as will perhaps by now be apparent, was not in the best of moods in the wake of the Maunsleigh dinner-party.

    “Hullo, Humphreys,” said Colonel Langford, grinning. “Thought y’might care to hear me report.”

    Powell Humphreys smiled at him but said: “I have already had a full report of the violet taffety, Colonel.”

    “Oh, was that what it was? She mention the diamonds, too?”

    “Mm. According to her they are of the first water, but then, she is partisan,” he admitted.

    The Colonel pulled up a chair next to Mr Humphreys’s couch, not remarking on the fact that the invalid was lying back with his legs up and a rug over them; he was aware he disliked fuss. “Well,” he admitted, “think they must be. The Somerton hag turned as blue as her dress the moment she clapped eyes on ’em, and Ma Patterson went a sort of mottled puce. Didn’t go with her dress, though, it were a sort of green thing, with puffed stuff and bows and so forth.”

    “Graphic,” he replied, smiling.

    Winking, the Colonel said: “Heard about the food?”

    “In enormous but possibly apocryphal detail.”

    “Ah. Well, they didn’t go so far as to have an actual roast swan on the table with all its plumage replaced, but it was damned close to it.”

    “So I gathered.”

    “The best part was Midge’s putting old Ma Cumbridge—do you know her? Funny old bird that’s some sort of aunt of Bottomley-Pugh’s—putting her next the Bishop.” He winked again.

    “My sister enjoyed that, too,” he said tranquilly.

    Choking, the Colonel admitted: “Between you and me, Jarvis wasn’t too pleased, but he let her have her way. Well, she had Ventnor to her right, poor little soul, so I suppose you could say she'd done her duty.”

    “Mm. And violet taffety apart, how did she bear up?”

    “Rather well. None of the cats dared to look down their noses, of course: it does help to out-rank every other lady in the room. In great looks, too. Managed the after-dinner stuff well: had the Patterson girls play,”—Powell Humphreys winced—“and then David Golightly. –You must come over to Kendlewood Place some time when they’re coming to us: Lettice can only tinkle on the instrument a bit, y’know, but I’ve had it tuned: we’ll get him to play!”

    “Thank you: I should very much enjoy that,” he said calmly. “May I enquire whether you thought relations between the Earl and Countess were, as my sister described them, perfectly harmonious and of the most devoted?”

    The Colonel pulled his ear. “Uh—wouldn’t say that. Well, early days, of course! As I say, he admitted to me he’d rather she hadn’t invited old Ma C. at all. Well, not to that particular do, he meant. Think he rather likes the old duck, personally.”

    “Mm.”

    “Uh—Midge has a trick of making herself adored by her servants, y’know. They supported her magnificently.”

    “Oh, yes, I am sure.”

    “Uh—they rather over-did it, actually,” admitted the Colonel. “She sent for cushions for the females—we were in the damned yellow withdrawing-room, size of a damned barracks and about as comfortable—and the entire complement of footmen came in in a procession with ’em. Embarrassin’, really.”

    “And what did Sleyven think of that?’

    “Don’t ask me, old man! I’ve known him most of my life, but it’s beyond me to read his face!”

    Mr Humphreys nodded.

    “S’pose you’ve heard Arthur is to have Little Jefford?”

    “Of course.”

    “Mm. Won’t make them any closer to us, but Midge tells us Jarvis is cutting a path through the park to the northeast. There was a sort of track: the way I heard it, he was merely making a respectable path, but turns out he’s widening it to the size of a carriage-way: Midge and Polly will be able to visit quite easily.”

    “So I believe.” Mr Humphreys gave him a mocking look. “Little Jefford, of course, is in the gift of the diocese.”

    “Uh—yes.”

    “However, the Wynton patrimony includes considerable freeholds in several towns, quite apart from the London properties, which are extensive.”

    “Uh—yes?” groped the Colonel.

    “Including Bath,” said Mr Humphreys dreamily.

    “Eh?”

    “One gathers—pray don’t mention this to the womenfolk, Langford—one gathers that an offer was made to decrease considerably the rent of a house in Bath which is occupied, quite coincidentally, by two widowed sisters of the incumbent—the recent incumbent—of Little Jefford.”

    The Colonel choked. “Good God, dear man! Letty and Midge are under the impression that it was a combination of good luck, Polly’s connections, and the power of prayer!”

    “Quite. Well, it was certainly Polly’s connections.”

    “Are you sure?”

    “Absolutely. I had it from Shelby; he was bursting to tell somebody and apparently fixed on me as sufficiently close-mouthed. Overlooking the fact that I might then burst with the need to impart it.”

    The Colonel nodded numbly and croaked: “I most certainly won’t breathe a word. Lord, Midge was telling me t’other night how pleased Jarvis was when she broke the news to him!”

    “Yes, my sister said the very same thing,” he said tranquilly.

    After a moment Colonel Langford said with feeling: “By God, if that ain’t Jarvis all over! What the lower ranks and the chummery don’t need to know, won’t hurt ’em!”

    “So one gathers,” said Powell Humphreys calmly.

Next chapter:

https://thepatchworkparasol.blogspot.com/2022/11/other-ranks.html