A Buyer's Market Part 4

Mr. Deacon was delighted by this frank expression of opinion. There was, naturally, no reason why he should possess any knowledge of Widmerpool, whom I discovered in due course to be-in Mr. Deacon's pre-determined view and own words-"a typical empty-headed young fellow with more money than is good for him" who was now preparing to tell an older man, and an artist, "what was what in the field of painting." This was, indeed, the kind of situation in which Mr. Deacon had all his life taken pleasure, and such eminence as he had, in fact, achieved he owed largely to making a habit of speaking in an overbearing and sarcastic, sometimes almost insulting, manner to the race thus generically described as having "more money than was good for them." He looked upon himself as the appointed scourge of all such persons, amongst whom he had immediately cla.s.sed Widmerpool. The mistake was perhaps inevitable in the circ.u.mstances. In fairness to Mr. Deacon it should be added that these onslaughts were almost without exception accepted by the victims themselves-a fact borne out by Barnby-as in some eclectic manner complimentary, so that no harm was done; even good, if the sale of Mr. Deacon's pictures could be so regarded.

"Should I ever have the honour of meeting her Ladys.h.i.+p," said Mr. Deacon, with the suggestion of a flourish, "I shall much look forward to a discussion on the subject of that interesting interesting inst.i.tution, the Royal Academy. When in need of mirth, I should be lost without it. I expect Isbister, R.A., is one of her special favourites." inst.i.tution, the Royal Academy. When in need of mirth, I should be lost without it. I expect Isbister, R.A., is one of her special favourites."

"I have not heard her mention his name," said Widmerpool, forgoing none of his seriousness. "But, for my own part, I was not displeased with Isbister's portrait of Cardinal Whelan at Burlington House last year. I preferred it to-was it the wife of the Solicitor-General-that was so much praised?"

It showed a rather remarkable effort of will on the part of Widmerpool, whose interest in such matters was not profound, to have been able to quote these examples on the spur of the moment; and there is no knowing into what inextricable tangle this subject would have led them both, if their conversation had not been mercifully interrupted by the girl, who now said: "Are we going to stand here all night? My feet hurt."

"But how shameful," said Mr. Deacon, with all his earlier formality. "I have not introduced you yet. This is Miss Gypsy Jones. Perhaps you have already met. She goes about a great deal."

I mentioned Widmerpool's name in return, and Miss Jones nodded to us, without showing much sign of friendliness. Her face was pale, and she possessed an almost absurdly impudent expression, in part natural outcome of her cast of features, but also, as almost immediately became apparent, in an even greater degree product of her temperament. She looked like a thoroughly ill-conditioned errand-boy. Her forehead had acquired a smudge of coal-dust or lamp-black, darker and denser than, though otherwise comparable to, the smudge on Tompsitt's s.h.i.+rt-front. It seemed to have been put there deliberately to offset her crimson mouth. Like Mr. Deacon, she too clutched a pile of papers under her arm, somehow suggesting in doing so the appearance of one of those insects who carry burdens as large, or even larger, than their own puny frame.

"You must wonder why we are on our way home at this late hour," said Mr. Deacon. "We have been attempting in our poor way to aid the cause of disarmament at Victoria Station."

Mr. Deacon's purpose had not, in fact, occurred to me-it is later in life that one begins to wonder about other people's activities-nor was it immediately made clear by Gypsy Jones extracting a kind of broadsheet from the sheaf under her arm, and holding it towards Widmerpool.

"Penny, War Never Pays! War Never Pays!" she said.

Widmerpool, almost counterfeiting the secretive gesture of Lady Walpole-Wilson pressing money on Archie Gilbert in the taxi, fumbled in his trouser pocket, and in due course pa.s.sed across a coin to her. In return she gave him the sheet, which, folding it without examination, he transferred to an inner pocket on his hip or in his tails. Scarcely knowing how to comment on the dealings in which Mr. Deacon and his companion were engaged. I inquired whether night-time was the best season to dispose of this publication.

"There is the depot," said Mr. Deacon. "And then some of the late trains from the Continent. It's not too bad a pitch, you know."

"And now you are going home?"

"We decided to have a cup of coffee at the stall by Hyde Park Corner," said Mr. Deacon, adding with what could only be described as a deep giggle: "I felt I could venture there chaperoned by Gypsy. Coffee can be very grateful at this hour. Why not join us in a cup?"

While he was speaking a taxi cruised near the kerb on the far side of the road. Widmerpool was still staring rather wildly at Gypsy Jones, apparently regarding her much as a doctor, suspecting a malignant growth, might examine a diseased organism under the microscope; although I found later than any such diagnosis of his att.i.tude was far from the true one. Thinking that physical removal might put him out of his supposed misery, I asked if he wanted to hail the pa.s.sing cab. He glanced uncertainly across the street. For a second he seemed seriously to contemplate the taxi; and then, finally, to come to a decision important to himself.

"I'll join you in some coffee, if I may," he said. "On thinking things over, coffee is just what I need myself."

This resolution was unexpected, to say the least. However, if he wanted to prolong the night in such company, I felt that determination to be his own affair. So far as I was myself concerned, I was not unwilling to discover more of someone like Mr. Deacon who had loomed as a mysterious figure in my mind in the manner of all persons discussed by grown-ups in the presence of a child.

We set off up the hill together, four abreast: Widmerpool and Gypsy Jones on the flanks. Across the road the coffee-stall came into sight, a spot of light round which the scarlet tunics and white equipment of one or two Guardsmen still flickered like the bright wings of moths attracted from nocturnal shadows by a flame. From the park rose the heavy scent of London on a summer night. Here, too, bands could be heard distantly throbbing. We crossed the road at the island and joined a knot of people round the stall, at the side of which, as if killing time while he waited for a friend late in arrival, an elderly person in a dinner-jacket was very slowly practising the Charleston, swaying his weight from one side of his patent leather shoes to the other, while he kept the tips of his fingers delicately in his coat pockets. Mr. Deacon glanced at him with disapproval, but acknowledged, though without warmth, the smirk proffered by a young man in a bright green suit, the uncomfortable colour of which was emphasised by auburn hair, erratically dyed. This was perhaps not a spot one might have chosen to soothe Widmerpool after his unfortunate experience with Barbara and the sugar. All the same, at the far end of the stall's little counter, he seemed already to have found something to discuss with Gypsy Jones-aspects of the question of the Haig statue, possibly, or the merits of Isbister's portrait-painting-and both of them seemed fairly happy. Mr. Deacon began to explain to me how contemporary Paris had become "altogether too rackety" for his taste.

"The Left Bank was all right when I met you in the Louvre with your family," he said. "Wasn't the Peace Conference in progress then? I didn't take much interest in such things in those days. Now I know better. The truth is one gets too intimate with too many people if one stays in Montparna.s.se too long. I have come back to England for a little quiet. Besides, the French can be very interfering in their own particular way."

Purveying War Never Pays! War Never Pays! at midnight in the company of Gypsy Jones seemed, on the face of it, a capricious manner of seeking tranquillity; but-as I knew nothing of the life abandoned by Mr. Deacon to which such an undertaking was alternative-the extent of its potentially less tempting contrasts was impossible to gauge. Regarded from a conventional standpoint, Mr. Deacon gave the impression of having gone down-hill since the days when he had been accustomed to visit my parents, to whom he made little or no reference beyond expression of pious hopes that both of them enjoyed good health. It appeared that he was himself now running a curiosity-shop in the neighbourhood of Charlotte Street. He pressed me to "look him up" there at the earliest opportunity, writing the address on the back of an envelope. In spite of his air of being set apart from worldly things, Mr. Deacon discoursed with what at least sounded like a good deal of practical common sense regarding the antique business, hours spent in the shop, time given to buying, closing arrangements, and such material points. I did not know what his financial position might be, but the shop was evidently providing, for the time being, an adequate livelihood. at midnight in the company of Gypsy Jones seemed, on the face of it, a capricious manner of seeking tranquillity; but-as I knew nothing of the life abandoned by Mr. Deacon to which such an undertaking was alternative-the extent of its potentially less tempting contrasts was impossible to gauge. Regarded from a conventional standpoint, Mr. Deacon gave the impression of having gone down-hill since the days when he had been accustomed to visit my parents, to whom he made little or no reference beyond expression of pious hopes that both of them enjoyed good health. It appeared that he was himself now running a curiosity-shop in the neighbourhood of Charlotte Street. He pressed me to "look him up" there at the earliest opportunity, writing the address on the back of an envelope. In spite of his air of being set apart from worldly things, Mr. Deacon discoursed with what at least sounded like a good deal of practical common sense regarding the antique business, hours spent in the shop, time given to buying, closing arrangements, and such material points. I did not know what his financial position might be, but the shop was evidently providing, for the time being, an adequate livelihood.

"There are still a few people who are prepared to pay for nice things," he remarked.

When given coffee, he had handed back his cup, after examination, in objection to the alleged existence on the rim of the china of cracks and chips" in which poison might collect."

"I am always worried as to whether or not the crockery is properly washed up in places like this," he said.

Reflectively, he turned in his hand the cup that had replaced the earlier one, and continued to digress on the general inadequacy of sanitary precautions in shops and restaurants.

"It's just as bad in London as in Paris cafes-worse in some ways," he said.

He had just returned the second cup as equally unsatisfactory, when someone at my elbow asked: "Can one get matches here?" I was standing half-turned away from the counter, listening to Mr. Deacon, and did not see this new arrival. For some reason the voice made me glance towards Widmerpool; not because its tone bore any resemblance to his own thick utterance, but because the words suggested, oddly enough, Widmerpool's almost perpetual presence as an unvaried component of everyday life rather than as an unexpected element of an evening like this one. A moment later someone touched my arm, and the same voice said: "Where are you off to, may I ask, in all those fine clothes?" A tall, pale young man, also in evening dress, though without a hat, was standing beside me.

At first sight Stringham looked just the same; indeed, the fact that on the former occasion, as now, he had been wearing a white tie somehow conveyed the illusion that he had been in a tail-coat for all the years since we had last met. He looked tired, perhaps rather irritable, though evidently pleased to fall in like this with someone known to him. I was conscious of that peculiar feeling of restraint in meeting someone, of whom I had once seen so much, now dropped altogether from everyday life: an extension-and refinement, perhaps-of the sensation no doubt mutually experienced between my parents and Mr. Deacon on that day in the Louvre: more acute, because I had been far more closely a.s.sociated with Stringham than ever they with Mr. Deacon. The presence of Widmerpool at the stall added a touch of fantasy to Stringham's appearance at that spot; for it was as if Widmerpool's own antics had now called his mimic into being as inexorable accessory to any real existence to which Widmerpool himself might aspire. I introduced Mr. Deacon and Gypsy Jones.

"Why, hallo, Stringham," said Widmerpool, putting down his coffee-cup with a clatter and puffing out his cheeks in a great demonstration of heartiness. "We haven't met since we were at Le Bas's."

He thought, no doubt-if he thought of the matter at all-that Stringham and I were friends who continued to see each other often, inevitably unaware that this was, in fact, our first meeting for so long. Stringham, on his side, clearly supposed that all four of us-Widmerpool, Mr. Deacon, Gypsy Jones, and myself-had been spending an evening together; though it was obvious that he could determine no easy explanation for finding me in Widmerpool's company, and judged our companions.h.i.+p immensely funny. He laughed a lot when I explained that Widmerpool and I had been to the Huntercombes' dance.

"Well, well," he said. "It's a long time since I went to a dance. How my poor mother used to hate them when my sister was first issued to an ungrateful public. Was it agony?"

"May one inquire why you should suppose a splendid society ball to have been agony?" asked Mr. Deacon, rather archly.

There could be no doubt that, at first sight, he had taken a great fancy to Stringham. He spoke in his ironically humorous voice from deep down in his throat.

"In the first place," said Stringham, "I rather dislike being crowded and uncomfortable-though, heaven knows, dances are not the only places where that happens. A most serious criticism I put forward is that one is expected, when attending them, to keep at least moderately sober."

When he said this, it struck me that Stringham had already, perhaps, consumed a few drinks before meeting us.

"And otherwise behave with comparative rect.i.tude?" said Mr. Deacon, charmed by this answer. "I believe I understand you perfectly."

"Exactly," said Stringham. "For that reason I am now on my way-as I expect you are too-to Milly Andriadis's. I expect that will be crowded and uncomfortable too, but at least one can behave as one wishes there."

"Is that woman still extorting her toll from life?" asked Mr. Deacon.

"Giving a party in Hill Street this very night. I a.s.sumed you were all going there."

"This coffee tastes of glue," said Gypsy Jones, in her small, rasping, though not entirely unattractive voice.

She was dissatisfied, no doubt, with the lack of attention paid to her; though possibly also stimulated by the way events were shaping.

"One heard a lot of Mrs. Andriadis in Paris," said Mr. Deacon, taking no notice of this interruption. "In fact, I went to a party of hers once-at least I think she was joint hostess with one of the Murats. A deplorable influence she is, if one may say so."

"One certainly may," said Stringham. "She couldn't be worse. As a matter of fact, my name is rather intimately linked with hers at the moment-though naturally we are unfaithful to each other in our fas.h.i.+on, when opportunity arises, which in my case, I have to confess, is not any too often."

I really had no very clear idea what all this talk was about, and I had never heard of Mrs. Andriadis. I was also uncertain whether Stringham truly supposed that we might all be on our way to this party, or if he were talking completely at random. Mr. Deacon, however, seemed to grasp the situation perfectly, continuing to laugh out a series of deep chuckles.

"Where do you come from now?" I asked.

"I've a flat just round the corner," said Stringham. "At first I couldn't make up my mind whether I was in the vein for a party, and thought a short walk would help me decide. To tell the truth, I have only just risen from my couch. There had, for one reason and another, been a number of rather late nights last week, and, as I didn't want to miss poor Milly's party in case she felt hurt-she is too touchy for words-I went straight home to bed this afternoon so that I might be in tolerable form for the festivities-instead of the limp rag one feels most of the time. It seemed about the hour to stroll across. Why not come, all of you? Milly would be delighted."

"Is it near?"

"Just past those Sa.s.soon houses. Do come. That is, if none of you mind low parties."

2.

UNCE GILES'S standard of values was, in most matters, ill-adapted to employment by anyone except himself. At the same time, I can now perceive that by unhesitating contempt for all human conduct but his own-judged among his immediate relatives as far from irreproachable-he held up a mirror to emphasise latent imperfections of almost any situation that momentary enthusiasm might, in the first instance, have overlooked. His views, in fact, provided a kind of yardstick to the proportions of which no earthly yard could possibly measure up. This unquestioning condemnation of everyone, and everything, had no doubt supplied armour against some of the disappointments of life; although any philosophical satisfaction derived from reliance on these sentiments had certainly not at all diminished my uncle's capacity for grumbling, in and out of season, at anomalies of social behaviour to be found, especially since the war, on all sides. To look at things through Uncle Giles's eyes would never have occurred to me; but-simply as an exceptional expedient for attempting to preserve a sense of proportion, a state of mind, for that matter, neither always acceptable nor immediately advantageous-there may have been something to be said for borrowing, once in a way, something from Uncle Giles's method of approach. This concept of regarding one's own affairs through the medium of a friend or relative is not, of course, a specially profound one; but, in the case of my uncle, the field of vision surveyed was always likely to be so individual to himself that almost any scene contemplated from this point of vantage required, on the part of another observer, more than ordinarily drastic refocusing.

He would, for example, have dismissed the Huntercombes' dance as one of those formal occasions that he himself, as it were by definition, found wholly unsympathetic. Uncle Giles disapproved on principle of anyone who could afford to live in Belgrave Square (for he echoed almost the identical words of Mr. Deacon regarding people "with more money than was good for them"), especially when they were, in addition, bearers of what he called "handles to their names"; though he would sometimes, in this same connection, refer with conversational familiarity, more in sorrow than anger, to a few members of his own generation, known to him in a greater or lesser degree in years gone by, who had been brought by inheritance to this unhappy condition. He had, for some reason, nothing like so strong an aversion for recently acquired wealth-from holders of which, it is true, he had from time to time even profited to a small degree-provided the money had been ama.s.sed by owners safely to be despised, at least in private, by himself or anyone else; and by methods commonly acknowledged to be indefensible. It was to any form of long-established affluence that he took the gravest exception, particularly if the owners.h.i.+p of land was combined with any suggestion of public service, even when such exertions were performed in some quite unspectacular, and apparently harmless, manner, like sitting on a borough council, of helping at a school-treat. "Interfering beggars," he used to remark of those concerned.

My uncle's dislike for the incidence of Mrs. Andriadis's party-equally, as a matter of course, overwhelming-would have required, in order to avoid involving himself as an auxiliary of more than negative kind in some warring faction, the selection of a more careful approach on his part than that adopted to display potential disapproval of the Huntercombes; for, by taking sides too actively, he might easily find himself in the position of defending one or another of the systems of conducting human existence which he was normally to be found attacking in another sector of the battlefield. At the same time, it would hardly be true to say that Uncle Giles was deeply concerned with the question of consistency in argument. On the contrary, inconsistency in his own line of thought worried him scarcely at all. As a matter of fact, if absolutely compelled to make a p.r.o.nouncement on the subject, he-or, so far as that went, anyone else investigating the matter-might have taken a fairly firm stand on the fact that immediate impressions at Mrs. Andriadis's were not, after all, greatly different from those conveyed on first arrival at Belgrave Square.

The house, which had the air of being rented furnished only for a month or two, was bare; somewhat unattractively decorated in an anonymous style which, at least in the upholstery, combined touches of the Italian Renaissance with stripped panelling and furniture of "modernistic" design, these square, metallic pieces on the whole suggesting Berlin rather than Paris. Although smaller than the Huntercombes', my uncle would have detected there a decided suggestion of wealth, and also-something to which his objection was, if possible, even more deeply ingrained-an atmosphere of frivolity. Like many people whose days are pa.s.sed largely in a state of inanition, when not of crisis, Uncle Giles prided himself on his serious approach to life, deprecating nothing so much as what he called "trying to laugh things off"; and it was true that a lifetime of laughter would scarcely have sufficed to exorcise some of his own fiascos.

On the whole, Mrs. Andriadis's guests belonged to a generation older than that attending the dance, and their voices swelled more loudly throughout the rooms. The men were in white ties and the ladies' dresses were carried in general with a greater flourish than at the Huntercombes': some of the wearers distinctly to be cla.s.sed as "beauties." A minute sprinkling of persons from both s.e.xes still in day clothes absolved Mr. Deacon and Gypsy Jones from looking quite so out of place as might otherwise have been apprehended; and, during the course of that night, I was surprised to notice how easily these two (who had deposited their unsold copies of War Never Pays! War Never Pays! in the hall, under a high-backed crimson-and-gold chair, designed in an uneasy compromise between in the hall, under a high-backed crimson-and-gold chair, designed in an uneasy compromise between avant garde avant garde motifs and seventeenth-century Spanish tradition) faded un.o.btrusively into the general background of the party. There were, indeed, many girls present not at all dissimilar in face and figure to Gypsy Jones; while Mr. Deacon, too, could have found several prototypes of himself among a contingent of sardonic, moderately distinguished, grey-haired men, some of whom smelt of bath-salts, dispersed here and there throughout the gathering. The comparative formality of the scene to be observed on our arrival had cast a certain blight on my own-it now seemed too ready-acceptance of Stringham's a.s.surance that invitation was wholly unnecessary; for the note of "frivolity," to which Uncle Giles might so undeniably have taken exception, was, I could not help feeling, infused with an undercurrent of extreme coolness, a chilly consciousness of conflicting egoisms, far more intimidating than anything normally to be met with at Walpole-Wilsons', Huntercombes', or, indeed, anywhere else of "that sort." motifs and seventeenth-century Spanish tradition) faded un.o.btrusively into the general background of the party. There were, indeed, many girls present not at all dissimilar in face and figure to Gypsy Jones; while Mr. Deacon, too, could have found several prototypes of himself among a contingent of sardonic, moderately distinguished, grey-haired men, some of whom smelt of bath-salts, dispersed here and there throughout the gathering. The comparative formality of the scene to be observed on our arrival had cast a certain blight on my own-it now seemed too ready-acceptance of Stringham's a.s.surance that invitation was wholly unnecessary; for the note of "frivolity," to which Uncle Giles might so undeniably have taken exception, was, I could not help feeling, infused with an undercurrent of extreme coolness, a chilly consciousness of conflicting egoisms, far more intimidating than anything normally to be met with at Walpole-Wilsons', Huntercombes', or, indeed, anywhere else of "that sort."

However, as the eye separated individuals from the ma.s.s, marks of a certain exoticism were here revealed, notably absent from the scene at Belgrave Square: such deviations from a more conventional standard alleviating, so far as they went, earlier implications of stiffness; although these intermittent patches of singularity-if they were to be regarded as singular-were, on the whole, not necessarily predisposed to put an uninvited newcomer any more at his ease; except perhaps in the sense that one act of informality in such surroundings might, roughly speaking, be held tacitly to excuse another.

For example, an elderly gentleman with a neat white moustache and eye-gla.s.s, evidently come from some official a.s.semblage-perhaps the reception at the Spanish Emba.s.sy-because he wore miniatures, and the cross of some order in white enamel and gold under the points of his collar, was conversing with a Negro, almost tawny in pigmentation, rigged out in an elaborately waisted and square-shouldered tail-coat with exaggeratedly pointed lapels. It was really this couple that had made me think of Uncle Giles, who, in spite of advocacy of the urgent dissolution of the British Empire on grounds of its despotic treatment of backward races, did not greatly care for coloured people, whatever their origin; and, unless some quite exceptional circ.u.mstance sanctioned the admixture, he would certainly not have approved of guests of African descent being invited to a party to which he himself had been bidden. In this particular case, however, he would undoubtedly have directed the earlier momentum of his disparagement against the man with the eye-gla.s.s, since my uncle could not abide the wearing of medals. "Won 'em in Piccadilly, I shouldn't wonder," he was always accustomed to comment, when his eye fell on these outward and visible awards, whoever the recipient, and whatever the occasion.

Not far from the two persons just described existed further material no less vulnerable to my uncle's censure, for a heavily-built man, with a greying beard and the air of a person of consequence, was unsuccessfully striving, to the accompaniment of much laughter on both sides, to wrest a magnum of champagne from the hands of an ancient dame, black-browed, and wearing a tiara, or jewelled head-dress of some sort, who was struggling manfully to retain possession of the bottle. Here, therefore, were a.s.sembled in a single group-as it were of baroque sculpture come all at once to life-three cla.s.ses of object all equally abhorrent to Uncle Giles; that is to say, champagne, beards, and tiaras: each in its different way representing sides of life for which he could find no good to say; beards implying to him Bohemianism's avoidance of those practical responsibilities with which he always felt himself burdened: tiaras and champagne unavoidably conjuring up images of guilty opulence of a kind naturally inimical to "radical" principles.

Although these relatively exotic embellishments to the scene occurred within a framework on the whole commonplace enough, the s.h.i.+fting groups of the party created, as a spectacle, illusion of moving within the actual confines of a picture or tapestry, into the depths of which the personality of each new arrival had to be automatically amalgamated; even in the case of apparently una.s.similable material such as Mr. Deacon or Gyspy Jones, both of whom, as I have said, were immediately absorbed, at least to the eye, almost as soon as they had crossed the threshold of Mrs. Andriadis.

"Who is this extraordinary old puss you have in tow?" Stringham had asked, while he and I had walked a little ahead of the other three, after we had left the coffee-stall.

"A friend of my parents."

"Mine know the oddest people too-especially my father. And Miss Jones? Also a friend-or a cousin?"

He only laughed when I attempted to describe the circ.u.mstances that had led to my finding myself with Mr. Deacon, who certainly seemed to require some explanation at the stage of life, and of behaviour, that he had now reached. Stringham pretended to think-or was at least unwilling to disbelieve-that Gypsy Jones was my own chosen companion, rather than Mr. Deacon's. However, he had shown no sign of regarding either of them as noticeably more strange than anyone else, encountered on a summer night, who might seem eligible to be asked to a party given by a friend. It was, indeed, clear to me that strangeness was what Stringham now expected, indeed, demanded from life: a need already become hard to satisfy. The detachment he had always seemed to possess was now more marked than ever before. At the same time he had become in some manner different from the person I had known at school, so that, in spite of the air almost of relief that he had shown at falling in with us, I began to feel uncertain whether, in fact, Anne Stepney had not used the term "pompous" in the usual, and not some specialised, sense. Peter Templer, too, I remembered had employed the same word years before at school when he had inquired about Stringham's family. "Well, I imagine it was all rather pompous even at lunch, wasn't it?" he had asked. At that time I a.s.sociated pomposity with Le Bas, or even with Widmerpool, both of whom habitually indulged in mannerisms unthinkable in Stringham. Yet there could be no doubt that he now possessed a personal remoteness, a kind of preoccupation with his own affairs, that gave at least some prima facie prima facie excuse for using the epithet. All the rather elaborate friendliness, and apparent grat.i.tude for the meeting-almost as if it might offer means of escape from some burdensome commitment-was unquestionably part of a barrier set up against the rest of the world. Trying to disregard the gap, of which I felt so well aware, as it yawned between us, I asked about his family. excuse for using the epithet. All the rather elaborate friendliness, and apparent grat.i.tude for the meeting-almost as if it might offer means of escape from some burdensome commitment-was unquestionably part of a barrier set up against the rest of the world. Trying to disregard the gap, of which I felt so well aware, as it yawned between us, I asked about his family.

"My father sits in Kenya, quarrelling with his French wife."

"And your mother?"

"Similarly occupied with Buster over here."

"At Glimber?"

"Glimber-as arranged by Buster-is let to an Armenian. They now live in a house of more reasonable proportions at Sunningdale. You must come there one day-if only to see dawn breaking over the rock garden. I once arrived there in the small hours and had that unforgettable experience."

"Is Buster still in the Navy?"

"Not he."

"A gentleman of leisure?"

"But much humbled. No longer expects one to remember every individual stroke he made during the polo season."

"So you both rub along all right?"

"Like a house on fire," said Stringham. "All the same, you know parents-especially step-parents-are sometimes a bit of a disappointment to their children. They don't fulfil the promise of their early years. As a matter of fact, Buster may come to the party if he can get away."

"And Miss Weedon?"

"Tuffy has left. I see her sometimes. She came into a little money. My mother changes her secretary every week now. She can't get along with anyone since Tuffy resigned."

"What about Peggy Stepney?"

"What, indeed?"

"I sat next to her sister, Anne, at dinner to-night."

"Poor Anne, I hope you were kind to her."

He gave no hint as to whether or not he was still involved with Peggy Stepney. I presumed that there was at least no longer any question of an engagement.

"Are you still secretary to Sir Magnus Donners?"

"Still to be seen pa.s.sing from time to time through the Donners-Brebner Buildings," said Stringham, laughing again. "It might be hard to establish my precise status there."

"Nice work if you can get it!"

"'A transient and embarra.s.sed spectre', as Le Bas used to say, when one tried to slip past him in the pa.s.sage without attracting undue attention. As a matter of fact I saw Le Bas not so long ago. He turned up at Cowes last year. Not my favourite place at the best of times, but Buster seems to like the life."

"Was Le Bas sailing?"

"Got up rather like a park-keeper. It is extraordinary how schoolmasters never get any older. In early life they settle on a cruising speed and just stick to it. Le Bas confused me with a Kenya friend of my father's called d.i.c.ky Umfraville-you probably know the name as a gentleman-rider-who left the school-sacked as a matter of fact-some fifteen or twenty years earlier than myself."

It was true that Le Bas, like most of his profession, was accustomed to behave as if never particularly clear as to the actual decade in which he might, at any given moment, be existing; but once a.s.suming that recognition had not been immediate, his supposition that Stringham was something more than twenty-three or twenty-four-whatever his age at their meeting at Cowes-was not altogether surprising, because he looked, so it seemed to me by then, at least ten years older than when we had last seen each other. At the same time, it was no doubt unreasonable to mistake Stringham for d.i.c.ky Umfraville, of whose activities in Kenya I remember Sillery speaking a word of warning towards the end of my first year at the university. However, tete-a-tete tete-a-tete conversation between Stringham and myself had now to come to an end, because by this time we had been admitted to the house, and the presence of a surrounding crowd of people put a stop to that kind of talk. conversation between Stringham and myself had now to come to an end, because by this time we had been admitted to the house, and the presence of a surrounding crowd of people put a stop to that kind of talk.

In one room the carpet had been rolled back, and a hunchback wearing a velvet smoking-jacket was playing an accordion, writhing backwards and forwards as he attacked his instrument with demiurgic frenzy.

"I took one look at you- That's all I meant to do- And then my heart-stood still ..."

To this music, cheek to cheek, two or three couples were dancing. Elsewhere the party, again resembling the Huntercombes', had spread over the entire building, its density as thick on landings and in pa.s.sages as among the rooms. There were people everywhere, and voices sounded from the upper levels of bedroom floors. Stringham pushed his way through this swarming herd, the rest of us following. There was a buffet in the drawing-room, where hired butlers were serving drinks. Moving through the closely packed mob, from which a powerful aroma of tobacco, alcohol, and cosmetics arose, like the scent of plants and flowers in some monstrous garden, we came suddenly upon Mrs. Andriadis herself, when a further, and enormous, field of speculation was immediately projected into being. Stringham took her hand.

"Milly ..."

"Darling ..." she said, throwing an arm round his neck and kissing him energetically. "Why so disgustingly late?"

"Overslept."

"Milly ought to have been there."

"Why wasn't she?"

"Milly thought this was going to be a horrible party and she was going to hate it."

"Not now?"

"Couldn't be."

I did not remember exactly what outward appearance I had planned before arrival for Mrs. Andriadis. A suspicion may not have been altogether suppressed that she might turn out to resemble, in physiognomy and dress, one of those formalised cla.s.sical figures from bronze or ceramic art, posed as Le Bas would sometimes contort himself; but my invention, though perhaps in one aspect ancient Greek, was certainly modern Greek in another. However, the shape any imaginary portrait may have taken was quite unlike this small woman with powder-grey hair, whose faint touch of a c.o.c.kney accent, like her coiffure, was evidently retained deliberately as a considered attraction. She was certainly pretty, though the effect was obtained in some indirect and un.o.btrusive manner. Her dark eyebrows were strongly marked.