At Lady Mollys - Anthony Powell

‘Rum bird, Umfraville,’ said Jeavons, thickly. ‘Don’t like him much. Knows everybody. Wasn’t a bit surprised when it turned out you’d met him before. Molly used to see quite a lot of him in the old days when he was a johnny about town.’

‘He married a girl much younger than himself as his fourth wife. They parted company, I hear.’

‘I know. The Bridgnorths’ second daughter,’ said Jeavons. ‘She has been to the house. Badly brought up. Been taken down a peg or two, I hope. Bad luck on Eddie Bridgnorth to have a girl like that. Done nothing to deserve it.’

Earlier in the evening, Jeavons had expressed only the vaguest knowledge of Umfraville’s last marriage. Now, he seemed familiar with all its essential aspects. His awareness seemed quite unpredictable from one moment to another. The compassionate tone in which he had named Lord Bridgnorth clearly voiced regret for a member of a caste rather than an individual, revealing for a split second a side of Jeavons on the whole concealed, though far more developed than might be supposed on brief acquaintance; the side, that is to say, which had by then entirely assimilated his wife’s social standpoint. Indeed, the words might have been uttered by Alfred Tolland, so conventional, yet at the same time so unaffected, was the reflection that Eddie Bridgnorth had done nothing to deserve a rackety daughter.

‘I think I’ll make a further inspection of these quarters,’ said Jeavons, rising. ‘Just as well to know your way about.’

He made at first towards the band, but a waiter redirected bim, and he disappeared through a small door. He was away a long time, during which two fresh elements were added to the composition of the room.

The first of these new components, a man and a woman, turned out to be Max Pilgrim and Heather Hopkins. They entered with the animation of professionals, almost as if their act had already begun, at once greeted by Umfraville who led them to a table near the band. I had never met Pilgrim, although I had more than once watched his performances at restaurants or cabarets, since that night, years before, when he had quarrelled so bitterly with poor Mr. Deacon at Mrs. Andriadis’s party. Tall and stooping, smiling through large spectacles, there was something mild and parsonic about his manner, as if he were apologising for having to draw peoples’ attention to their sins in so blatant a manner. He wore tails. Hopkins had cleaned herself up greatly since her application for the loan of an egg from Norah Tolland and Eleanor Walpole-Wilson. Her black coat and skirt, cut like a dinner jacket, had silk lapels above a stiff shirt, butterfly collar and black bow tie. Her silk stockings were black, too, and she wore a bracelet round her left ankle.

This couple had scarccly appeared when another, far less expected party came in, and were shown to a table evidently reserved for them. Mrs. Haycock led the way, followed by my old friend, Peter Templer; then Widmerpool, walking beside an unusually good-looking girl whose face I did not know. They were in evening dress. From the rather stiff way in which Templer carried himself, I guessed that he felt a shade self-conscious about the company he was keeping. By that time I was used to the idea that he no longer regarded Widmerpool with derision. After all, they did business together, and Widmerpool had helped Bob Duport to get a job. All the same, there remained something incongruous about finding Templer and Widmerpool embarked upon a partie carrée at a night club. Night clubs were so much to be regarded as Templer’s natural element, and so little Widmerpool’s, that there seemed even a kind of injustice that Widmerpool should in this manner be forced to operate in a field so inappropriate to himself; and, on top of that, for Templer to be covertly ashamed of his company.

In addition to his air of being — almost literally — a fish out of water, Widmerpool looked far from well. Still yellow from his jaundice, he had grown thinner. His dinner jacket hung on him in folds. His hair was ruffled. His back was bent like that of an elderly man. Perhaps it was this flagging aspect of Widmerpool’s that made Templer seem more elegant than ever. He, too, was thinner than when I had last seen him. His habitual tendency was to look just a little too well dressed, and that evening he gave the appearance of having walked straight out of his tailor’s wearing an entirely new outfit. This glossy exterior, in juxtaposition with Widmerpool, could hardly have been more sharply emphasised. The unknown pretty girl was wearing an unadventurous frock, but Mrs. Haycock was dressed to kill. Enclosed within a bright emerald-green dress with huge leg-of-mutton sleeves, she was talking with great vivacity to Templer, whose arm from time to time she took and squeezed. She looked younger than when I had last seen her.

Before any sign of recognition could take place between the members of this party and myself, the band withdrew from their position at the end of the room, and settled down at one of the tables. A moment later Pilgrim and Hopkins mounted the dais, Hopkins appropriating the pianist’s stool, while Pilgrim lounged against the drum. He glanced at his nails, like a nervous don about to lecture a rowdy audience of undergraduates. Hopkins struck a few bars on the piano with brutal violence. By that time Jeavons had returned.

‘Found it all right,’ he said.

‘Have you seen who has arrived?’

‘Saw them on my way back. You know Mrs. H. doesn’t look a bit different from what she looked like in 1917.’

This comment on Mrs. Haycock seemed to me an extraordinary proposition: either crudely untrue, or most uncomplimentary to her earlier appearance. In due course one learns, where individuals and emotions are concerned, that Time’s slide-rule can make unlikely adjustments. Angular and flamboyant, Mrs. Haycock was certainly not without powers of attraction, but I doubted whether Jeavons saw in those severe terms. It was impossible to say. That side of her may, indeed, have constituted her charm for him both at that moment and in 1917. On the other hand, both then and in Umfraville’s night club, she may have been equally no more than a romantic dream, a figure transcending any mere question of personal appearance. At that moment Pilgrim advanced a little way in front of the drum, and, in a shrill, hesitant voice, like that of an elderly governess, began to sing:

‘Di, Di, in her collar and tie,

Quizzes the girls with a monocled eye,

Sipping her hock in a black satin stock,

Or shooting her cuffs over pernod or bock …’

‘I’ve a damn good mind to ask her for a dance,’ said Jeavons. ‘Who are they with? Do you know them?’

‘The man is called Peter Templer. I’ve known him for years.’

‘And the other girl?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Who is Templer?’

‘A stockbroker. He was divorced not so long ago from a very pretty model, who then married a writer called Quiggin. Templer is like your friend in the Ordnance, a great one with the girls.’

‘Looks it,’ said Jeavons.

When Pilgrim and Hopkins had left their table, Umfraville had moved to the party of which Templer seemed to be host. He was talking to Mrs. Haycock. Templer began to gaze round the room. He caught sight of me and waved. I signalled back to him. Meanwhile, Pilgrim was continuing his song, while Hopkins thumped away vigorously, with a great deal of facility, at the piano.

‘Like a torpedo, in brogues or tuxedo,

She’s tearing around at Cap Cod, or the Lido;

From Bournemouth to Biarritz, the fashion parades

Welcome debonaire Di in her chic tailor-mades …’

‘You see this sort of song, for instance,’ said Jeavons. ‘Who the hell wants to listen to something like that? God knows what it is all about, for one thing. Songs were quite different when I was younger.’

The song came to an end and there was a little clapping.

Templer came across the dance floor to our table. I introduced him, explaining that Jeavons had brought me; and also that Jeavons knew Widmerpool and Mrs. Haycock. I told him that at once, to forestall comments that might easily be embarrassing in the mood to which Jeavons had abandoned himself.

‘So you already know that Widmerpool is getting married?’ said Templer. ‘I was hoping to break the news to you. I am disappointed.’

For someone in general so sure of himself, he was a shade self-conscious at being caught entertaining Widmerpool in a haunt of this kind: hardly a routine place to take a business acquaintance. He had probably hoped that the news of Widmerpool’s engagement, by its broad humour, would distract attention from his own immediate circumstances.

‘The old boy behaved rather well about my brother-in-law, Bob,’ he said, rather hurriedly. ‘And then Dicky kept on pestering me to come to this dive of his. Do you know Dicky?’

‘Just met him once before.’

‘And then the girl I’m with loves to be taken to places she thinks “amusing”. It seemed a chance of killing several birds with the same stone.’

‘Who is your girl?’

‘She is called Betty. I can never remember her married name. Taylor, is it? Porter? Something like that. We met at a dreadful bridge party the other day. Her husband is only interested in making money, she says. I can’t imagine what she finds amiss in that. Rather a peach, isn’t she?’

‘Certainly.’

‘Why don’t you both come over and join us?’

Templer addressed the question to me, but he turned in the direction of Jeavons as if to persuade him.

‘As you know our friend Widmerpool already,’ said Templer. ‘I need not explain what he is like. I know he’ll be glad to see both of you, even though he is a bit under the weather tonight.’

Rather to my surprise, Jeavons at once agreed to join the Templer party. I was not nearly so certain as Templer that Widmerpool would be glad to see us. Jeavons bored him; while Templer and I were such old friends that he might suspect some sort of alliance against himself. He was easily disturbed by such apprehensions.

‘What is wrong with Widmerpool?’

‘Feeling low generally,’ said Templer. ‘Mildred had to drag him out tonight. But never mind that. It is extraordinary those two should be engaged. Women may show some discrimination about whom they sleep with, but they’ll marry anybody.’

Templer was already, so it appeared, on Christian name terms with Mrs. Haycock. We moved across, bearing our bottle with us. Widmerpool, as I could have foretold, did not look too well pleased to have us at the same table, but his state of health disposed him to show this no more than by offering a rather sour greeting. Mrs. Haycock, on the other hand, was delighted by this increase in numbers. Flushed in the face, she looked as hard as nails. She could hardly be called handsome, but there was a dash about her that Widmerpool could justly feel lacking in his own life as a bachelor. It was surprising to me not merely that he should be alarmed at the prospect of becoming her husband, but that he should ever have had the courage to propose; although, at the same time, plenty of reasons for his doing so presented themselves. Probably he was prepared — for he did most things rationally — to accept, even to welcome, attributes in a wife other men might have approached with caution. At the same time, the notion that he was entirely actuated by ‘rational’ motives was also no doubt far from the truth. He was possibly not ‘in love’, but at the same time impelled by feelings, if less definable than ‘love’, no less powerful. It was perhaps his imagination which had been captured; which is, after all, something akin to love. Who can say? Mrs. Haycock turned a dazzling smile upon us.

‘I’m Molly’s husband,’ said Jeavons gruffly.

‘But, of course.’

She held out her hand, cordially, but without any suggestion that she knew him apart from her recent visit to the Jeavons house. It was certain, I had no doubt on that point, that she remembered nothing of having met him on the earlier occasion. I was curious to see how he would conduct himself. Mrs. Haycock faced me.

‘I know you are an old friend of Kenneth’s,’ she said. ‘As you can see, the poor boy is still as yellow as a guinea, isn’t he? It was over-eating that did it.’

‘But he is always so careful about his food.’

‘Of course, he fusses all the time,’ she said. ‘Or used to. That is just it. I won’t stand any nonsense of that sort. I like my food. Naturally, if you are banting, that is another matter. What I can’t stand is people who pick at carrots and patent foods and never have a drink.’

This description sounded a fairly exact definition of the meals Widmerpool enjoyed.

‘I have been making him take me to some decent restaurants — such as there are in this country — and showed him how good food can be. I suppose some of it must have disagreed with him. He is back having his own way now, dining off a sardine and a glass of Malvern water.’

Widmerpool himself smiled feebly at all this, as if making no attempt to deny the truth of the picture presented by her of his medical condition. All the time she was speaking, I could think of nothing but the story Jeavons had told me of his former adventure with her. Conversation became general, only Widmerpool continuing to sit in bleak silence. Templer’s girl had large, liquid eyes, and a drawl reminiscent of Mona’s. She was evidently very taken with Templer, gazing at him all the time, as if she could not believe her luck. I asked her what she thought of the Pilgrim-Hopkins turn.

‘Oh, they were good, weren’t they?’ she said. ‘Didn’t you think so, Peter?’

‘A frightfully old-fashioned couple,’ said Templer. ‘The only reason they are here is because their act was a flop at the Café de Madrid. Still, I’m glad you liked them, darling. It shows what a sweet nature you have. But I don’t want you to wear clothes like Miss Hopkins. You won’t do that, will you?’

She found this dissent from her own opinion delicious, darting excited, apprehensive glances at him from under her eyelashes. I saw that it was no good attempting, even conversationally, to compete. Mrs. Haycock would make easier going. I asked whether she and Widmerpool had decided where they were going to live after they were married.

‘That’s rather a big question,’ she said. ‘Kenneth’s business keeps him most of the time in London. I like the idea of making our headquarters in Paris. We could have a small flat over there quite cheaply — in some dingy neighbourhood, if necessary. But I’ve lived too long in France to want to live anywhere else now. Anyway, for most of the year. Then there are the boys. That’s another problem.’

I thought for a second that she must refer to a personal obligation she owed to some male group living probably on the Riviera, to be generically thus classified. Seeing that she had not made herself clear, she added:

‘My two sons, you know.’

‘Oh, yes.’

‘They are always cropping up.’