Less Than Angels Part 17

Good morning! Have you everything you want? Mrs. Bush usually provides a good selection of breakfast dishes when I have guests, so I hope you were able to find something you liked.' Professor Mainwaring paced up and down the dining-room, stroking his beard. It was half past nine on Sunday morning and a fine day. There was no trace of anxiety in his manner, from which it might be presumed that the news of the night before, whatever it had been, had not left any very deep impression. 'Miss Clovis keeps to her room,' he went on. 'She sent a message that she would breakfast there.'

'I hope she isn't ill?' asked Mark, politely but with a note of hope.

'Oh, no, just feeling a little tired, I think. I hope you all slept well?'

'Oh, excellently, thank you,' said Vanessa. 'It was lovely to hear owls in the trees. I felt really in the country.'

'It would have been appropriate if I could have arranged lions for you,' said Professor Mainwaring. 'My ancestor whose portrait you were admiring last night had a private menagerie'-he p.r.o.nounced the word in the French way which gave it an exotic and slightly shocking air-'I believe the roars of the beasts could be heard for miles. Of course when you are in the field you may hear them there.'

'I should think we are more likely to hear the roar of the high-powered motor-car of one of the urbanized anthropologists,'said Mark. 'At least in West Africa. New travel books will have t.i.tles like Through Yorubaland in a Cadillac rather than the good old First Footsteps kind of thing.'

'Yes, it is perhaps to be regretted,' said the Professor. 'Now, who is for church this morning?' he asked with startling briskness. Without waiting for an answer, he went on, ' Or would you prefer a walk in the woods? You remember your Wordsworth, of course, One impulse from a vernal wood, Will teach you more of man, Of moral evil and of good, Than all the sages can'.

Now indeed they were in a dilemma. They were none of them regular churchgoers though they would certainly have attended the service to please Professor Mainwaring. But the fact that he had offered them an alternative confused them. What did he expect them to do?

'Of course this wouldn't be a vernal wood,' said Mark, temporizing, 'though presumably one could get the same benefit from a wood in autumn.'

'It would be against my principles to go into a church,' said Primrose bluntly. 'So I'd rather go for a walk.'

'I sometimes go at home with my mother,' said Digby. 'Is the church here an ancient one?'

'No, it is rather ugly,' declared the Professor. 'It was built by an ancestor of mine in a style similar to this house, which was rebuilt, as you have probably guessed, about a hundred years ago. The old church was pulled down at the same time. My ancestor had his own ideas about architecture and ornament. Still, I imagine the prayers of the worshippers might be of better quality in an ugly building. They would be less likely to be distracted by their surroundings.'

This seemed a rather unusual view, for it is generally held that beauty and antiquity create the best atmosphere for worship, but n.o.body felt disposed to argue the point. In the end, Digby and Vanessa went to the morning service, while Mark and Primrose walked in the woods. It was not known how Professor Mainwaring and Miss Clovis spent their Sunday morning, but they appeared before lunch for drinks in the morning-room. The churchgoers felt a sense of virtue, for the singing had been hearty and the sermon short but good; the walkers had perhaps gained less spiritually, but their skins glowed from the fresh air and they felt ready for their lunch. Miss Clovis seemed rather subdued and pale. She drank two gla.s.ses of gin with steady concentration.

They sat down at the table for the last big meal of their stay, for it had been arranged that they should leave after an early cup of tea.

After the soup a pair of ducklings was brought on to a side table and Professor Mainwaring rose to carve them.

'I hope you all like the meat of brown-fleshed birds?' he asked.

'Oh, yes, thank you, I prefer it to chicken,' said Vanessa, and the others made suitable murmurs.

'I expect you are wondering why I asked you here for this week-end, instead of interviewing you more formally with my good colleagues Professor Fairfax and Dr. Vere,' the Professor went on.

'It has been very pleasant for us,' said Digby.

'Yes, and I feel that I know you all better now. Each one of you has appeared in his true colours, has emerged as a definite personality. You, my dear,' he turned to Primrose, 'are a brave young lady with Bolshevist views. I think you will go about trying to do good.'

Mark stifled a laugh.

'And you, Mr. Penfold,' continued the Professor turning to him, 'are a promising young man who will go far. I see you in a wealthy setting, a connoisseur of fine living, perhaps not as an anthropologist at all,' he mused, as if trying to reconcile a contradiction in terms here.

'I can't quite see myself taking a dozen of this excellent claret into the bush,' said Mark lightly, but inwardly he was cast down, for it seemed that he was not to be awarded one of the grants.

'And you,' he turned now to Vanessa, 'are an impressionable young lady, who will look for the romance of life. Perhaps you would find it difficult to take the detached view necessary for successful fieldwork.'

'Oh, dear,' Vanessa cried out, 'that means I haven't got a grant, then.'

Digby awaited his turn with a certain amount of complacency. It looked as if it was going to be Primrose and himself. All the same, he thought Mark's character reading much more interesting than his own which Professor Mainwaring was now giving out.

'I think you are a worthy young man,' he declared. 'You will not, perhaps, set the Thames on fire, or even the Niger or Zambezi,' he added with a chuckle, 'but you are very conscientious and will probably make an excellent husband and father.'

Mark shot a malicious glance at Digby, who was annoyed to feel himself blushing.

'I wonder how many of you have read Shakespeare's Timon of Athens?' asked the Professor. 'Not one of the great plays, but there are some fine pa.s.sages in it, and it may be appropriate here...'

'Felix, this is intolerable-you will have to tell them. You can't keep them in suspense any longer,' Miss Clovis burst out.

'Could not you tell them, my dear Esther? It might come better from a woman.'

'I? Certainly I will tell them.' She paused and took a gulp of wine, then began speaking in short gruff sentences. 'It is this. There is no money. And there are no research grants. Father Gemini has stolen it. We heard last night.'

n.o.body knew what to say.

'Oh, dear,' Digby ventured, feeling that the feebleness of his utterance accorded well with the character he had just been given.

'Sire, this is grievous news,' said Mark, the shock making him flippant.

The girls did not say anything at first, but after a while Vanessa asked what Father Gemini had to do with it and how could he have 'stolen' the money.

'Somehow, perhaps we shall never know how,' said Miss Clovis, 'he persuaded Mrs. Foresight to let him have the money she had promised to us for a research project of his own. Gertrude-Miss Lydgate-telephoned me last night to tell me. I am not sure that she herself is entirely guikless, though I cannot believe that she can have been a party to such a dastardly plan,' she concluded dramatically.

'Then Mrs. Foresight had not actually given the money?' asked Mark.

'Well, no,' Miss Clovis sounded fl.u.s.tered, 'but she had promised it. Isn't that so, Felix?'

'Yes, certainly she had promised it,' he said in a casual, almost uninterested tone. 'Now, I wonder if you can see why I am reminded of Timon of Athens? You have forgotten the play? Let me refresh your memory of the banquet scene. When the dishes are uncovered they are found to contain nothing but warm water.'

'Well, that certainly doesn't apply here,' said Digby, magnanimously, he felt.

'Afterwards,' continued Professor Mainwaring, 'Timon retires to a cave, but I don't think I can carry the parallel as far as that. I am very sorry that this has happened. Naturally I shall do all I can to see that you get grants for field research from somewhere, though really,' he mused, 'I often wonder whether the whole business of going out into the field to study a primitive tribe isn't vasdy overrated. Heat, discomfort, illness, frustration ... and at the end of it all-what?'He faced his hearers almost challenging them to answer him, but his sentence fell into silence. 'And now,' he went on, 'I shall retire to my-er-cave, there to meditate on the machinations of Minnie-Mrs. Foresight,' he added quickly. 'Henry will order a taxi to take you to the station as I have no motorcar of my own.'

The young people stood up rather sheepishly, then Vanessa went forward and shook his hand, thanking him for his hospitality; the others followed her example. Miss Clovis stayed with them and they had coffee together in the smoking- room.

'I can't help feeling that the Jesuits are behind this,' she said.

'But Father Gemini isn't a Jesuit, is he?' asked Mark.

Miss Clovis snorted. 'No, he isn't. The Jesuits are men of intellect, even their enemies must allow that. But he is known to have visited one of their establishments several times this year. I can imagine the plotting that went on there. Father Gemini is weak -he would be as wax in their hands. And Mrs. Foresight has taken him for a drive in her motor-car on more than one occasion. Who can tell what may have pa.s.sed between them then?'

'It might have been interesting to have heard their conversation,' said Digby mildly.

'Interesting! I should think so indeed.'

'If I may venture a criticism,' said Mark. 'I think it would have been better if Professor Mainwaring had been sure of the money before he attempted to award the grants.'

'I feel rather sorry for him,' said Vanessa warmly. 'This whole thing must have been a blow to his prestige. I think you can see by his rather odd behaviour that he is feeling it very deeply.'

'Oh, he will do another tour in the United States,' said Miss Clovis. 'He has not yet lost the power of persuading elderly ladies to part with their money.' There was a touch of contempt in her tone.

'It is a power we should all like to have,' said Mark. 'I wonder if a young man would have any chance of acquiring it?*

'Oh, you will go far, Mr. Penfold,' said Miss Clovis. 'That is obvious.'

'But in what direction?' asked Digby.

'We none of us know at the moment,' said Mark. 'I suppose we'd better see to our packing.'

'I hope this unfortunate affair doesn't mean that I shan't be seeing you at the research centre,' said Miss Clovis as they waited by the taxi.

'Oh, no, we shan't hold it against you,' said Mark almost insolently, but he might perhaps be excused for feeling that their relationship had undergone some subtle change which justified the tone.

'I think Miss Clovis was very upset,' said Digby, when they were in the train. 'After all it was rather a dreadful thing to happen-it will take some living down. Can't you just see Fairfax and Vere, yes and Todd and Apfelbaum too, rubbing their hands with glee, jumping for joy in the Antipodes? It will give us a kind of power, too. I think our status will be definitely improved now.'

'The whole system is wrong,' said Primrose indignantly. 'This being dependent on wealthy individuals for the money to do essential work.'

'A brave young lady with Bolshevist views,' chanted Mark, in mocking imitation of Professor Mainwaring's manner. He put his arms around her and attempted to kiss her, but she pushed him away and a good-natured struggle followed. Now that they were free from the strain of the week-end their conversation and behaviour became frivolous, almost licentious, and it was perhaps fortunate that the train was not crowded and they had a carriage to themselves.

Digby did a pa.s.sable imitation of Miss Clovis breaking the news; they concocted a plot to kidnap Professor Mainwaring and imprison him in a cave, and were just deciding which of the learned societies would be likely to provide the highest ransom when they arrived at Victoria Station.

Their high spirits continued throughout their evening meal which they had all together in a Corner House, but eventually they flagged and went their separate ways, Vanessa to her home in Kensington, Primrose to her lodgings in West Hampstead, Mark and Digby to their flat in Camden Town.

'I think,' said Digby with a self-consciously casual air, Til just ring up Deirdre and tell her what's happened. I hope it isn't too late-I shouldn't like to disturb the household.'

Rhoda answered the telephone. Deirdre was upstairs in her room, writing, or trying to compose, a letter to Tom. She was beginning to experience the difficulties of correspondence with a person for whom one feels infatuation rather than love or friendship. When she had finished telling him her rather meagre bits of news there seemed little else to say. She loved him, she missed him, she still felt like Scheherezade trying to keep his love and interest, but she could not go on saying these things. She even found herself wondering what Catherine would have said, but then Catherine was a writer of fiction and might look upon a letter as a piece of literature composed by herself to suit a particular person, rather than a spontaneous outpouring of the feelings. Deirdre had her own ideas, for who has not, of how to write a love letter, but Tom was the first person on whom she had ever practised the art, and somehow he did not seem to fit with the person who should receive the kind of letters she could write. His own were full of a variety of news which she could barely comment on intelligently, let alone equal-political intrigues, elections, local gossip-but once he wrote 'Do you remember that evening we went walking by the river and sat on the seat by the elderberry bushes? The smell of them reminded me of childhood-a moment out of Proust.' Deirdre had not remembered the flowers particularly, only that she had declared her love for the first time and he had seemed to accept it. Must I then read Proust? she asked herself despair- ingly, seeing the twelve blue volumes with red labels in Catherine's bookshelves, for she was not much of a reader at the best of times.

Her aunt's tap on the door and subsequent appearance in the room were almost a relief, though she looked annoyed at the interruption.

'Telephone for you, dear, a man's voice,' Rhoda could not resist adding, for it was not Bernard and she was curious to know who could be telephoning her niece at this late hour.

Deirdre approached the instrument suspiciously but her manner warmed when she heard Digby's voice. They had a very long conversation which Rhoda was able to hear through the drawing-room door which she had left ajar. Deirdre sounded indignant and tender by turns and said that she would meet whoever it was for lunch next day.

'I wonder if Tom would like that,' said Rhoda to her sister, who was mending one of Malcolm's shirts and listening to a religious talk on the Light Programme.

'What? Deirdre having lunch with another young man? But why shouldn't she?' asked Mabel in her usual mild tone 'After all, they aren't engaged, you know.'

'That was Digby Fox,' said Deirdre coming into the room 'Isn't it a shame, there's no money for the Foresight research grants after all. Father Gemini has pinched it for his linguistic research.'

'What, that little priest who is a friend of Miss Lydgate's?' asked Mabel. 'Fancy that I Such a funny-looking little man, too.'

'Digby Fox is a friend of Tom's isn't he?' asked Rhoda, adjusting the situation to her own satisfaction.

'Yes, and a friend of mine, too,' said Deirdre. 'I must go and tell Tom about this-I was just in the middle of writing to him.'

She still had a half sheet of air-letter to fill up and the news Digby had told her brought her nicely to the end of it. There was hardly even room for an affectionate ending. She read the letter through, kissed it, and then sealed it up. It would be nice having lunch with Digby tomorrow, she thought; it was the first time since Tom had gone away that she had consciously looked forward to anything.

Digby came away from the telephone smiling and humming a little indefinite tune. He saw himself, perhaps as Professor Mainwaring had described him, worthy, painstaking and biding his time. Perhaps it would be like the tortoise and the hare-Tom, with his narrow aristocratic face and brilliant grey eyes, and Digby-he paused to look at himself in the gla.s.s above the umbrella-stand-mousy fair hair, blue eyes, good teeth...

'Do you realize,' said Mark coming out of the kitchen, 'that we have absolutely nothing for breakfast tomorrow morning?'

'No, I didn't,' said Digby absently.

'We ate what there was yesterday, and haven't had a chance to do any shopping,' Mark explained. 'I think I shall ring up Catherine, she may be able to help us. Perhaps she'll invite us round for a gla.s.s of beer.'

But Catherine's telephone went on ringing in her empty flat while she sat drinking bitter with Alaric Lydgate in a nearby public house. She had taken the bold step-which she would hardly have advised her magazine readers to imitate-of inviting him round for Sunday evening supper, knowing what a depressing meal this can be for anyone who lives alone. Afterwards she had thought he might like to visit the local, and so here they sat at a little round wet taole and Catherine listened to Alaric talking about the trunks of notes he had up in his attic.

'Tom Mallow didn't approach me about them,' he said, 'and if he had, I should luve felt bound to refuse him access to them until I had written up the material myself.'

Catherine was too tactful to inform him that Tom hadn't thought the notes would be of any use to him. 'Yes, I can appreciate that', she said. 'But...' she looked up at him, her eyes rather wide and soft-looking with hardly a trace of their usual sardonic merriment, 'do you have to write up the material? I mean,' she went on, 'wouldn't it be rather a bother to have to do it?'

Her suggestion was so outrageous that he could think of absolutely nothing to say. Ever since he could remember, almost, he had been going to 'write up his material'. He felt as if the ground were slipping away from under his feet and it was quite an effort to stand up and walk to the bar for some more drinks.

When he came back Catherine noticed that he carried two double whiskies. Oh, dear, she thought, he looks terribly Easter Island, or even like Mr. Rochester in Jane Eyre.

'And what is going on in your head now?' he asked, a little sarcastic.

'I was thinking,' said Catherine slowly, 'that it isn't only we poor women who can find consolation in literature. Men can have the comfort of imagining themselves like Heathcliff or Mr. Rochester. I wonder if they often do?'

'What rubbish you talk,' he said brusquely. But suddenly the sun broke through on the grim surface of the carved rock and he smiled.

'But what should I do with all my notes if I didn't write them up?' he asked.

'Oh, we'd soon think of something,' said Catherine gaily.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

The first meeting between Miss Clovis and Miss Lydgate after the fatal week-end was a stormy one. Things were said on both sides which might be regretted afterwards, and both felt the perverse satisfaction which is to be got from saying things of precisely that kind. It is very seldom that we can tell our friends exactly what we think of them; for some the occasion never presents itself, and they are perhaps the poorer for not having experienced the exultation of flinging the buried resentment and the usually irrelevant insult at a dear friend.

Afterwards they were both exhausted and hungry. They went together to the kitchen and, with hands still shaking. Miss Lydgate attempted to open a tin of pilchards. Miss Clovis took over from her with rough affection.

'I'm sorry, Gertrude,' she declared. 'I can see now that this was none of your doing.'

Miss Lydgate was bending over the bread-bin to get out the loaf. 'Let's have a strong cup of Nescafe,' she said, 'we both need it. I can't help feeling,' she went on as she filled the kettle, 'that I might have been a little more intelligent, though. That day when we were having lunch, he hinted in that sly way of his - you know how he does-that he might be getting funds from somewhere. Perhaps I should have known?

'But if you had known, what could you have done?*

'I could have warned you and Felix. I could have spared you the strain of the week-end.'

'Well, the young things had some good meals, better than they usually get, I'm sure. That is something to the-good*