The Last Houseparty, page 20
* do hope you enjoy this kind of accidental Freudian pun. I do.
** About your mother: do not judge her for being a loose woman, which in a sense she is. I love her obsessively. I don’t believe she loves me in the same way, and why should she? I am a man to live with and go to bed with. I may be quantitatively more than that implies, but not qualitatively; I mean I think she would choose me for those purposes rather than some other man, but she’s really a bit puzzled by my feelings for her and can only pretend to share them. Now that I am to be posted abroad she may not remain faithful to me. I hope she won’t after my death.
*** By the by, look after Purser if it is in your power to do so. For all his absurd mien he is a good fellow and a friend.
**** More about this on separate sheet at end of letter.
X
1
Before Zena’s reign—BZ in Harry’s phrase—churchgoing at a Snailwood week-end was not a serious problem. Everybody went. The sort of person who did not expect to attend mattins on a Sunday morning was not the sort of person invited to Snailwood As for guests who might need to know the times of worship at the nearest synagogue, they were as likely as those enquiring where they could assist at a druidical sacrifice.
Under Zena’s rule anything became possible, from the out-and-out atheism of visitors such as Shaw, through the soggy credos of the modern young whose theology consisted of believing that Christianity had been a good notion until St Paul had made the mistake of thinking about it and thus ensured that churchgoing became rather a bore, to the devotional rigour of Father D’Arcy’s Catholic converts, who preferred to be accommodated with a chapel where the most elaborate ritual was attended by worshippers of the bluest blood
Despite this, enough people from Snailwood, family and visitors, usually came to the parish church for three pews to be reserved for them. Servants, gardeners and so on occupied another four pews west of the cross aisle. Zena was always there, despite having been to eight o’clock Communion every other Sunday. She wore a demure dark suit and unpretentious hat, sang psalms and hymns and responses in a true if metallic soprano, and put five pounds in the plate. For all these reasons the Reverend Barnabas Bird regarded her with even greater favour than parish priests were apt to feel for the titled mistress of the great house, and when, occasionally, reporters from the yellow press came and asked questions about the effect on a simple village of high jinks up at the castle, they found themselves filling their note-pads with uninterestingly virtuous deeds performed by her ladyship.
Lord Snailwood always came too, partly in order to be able to complain throughout luncheon about everything to do with the service, but mainly to read the first lesson. The fact that he was standing up at the lectern and the congregation was seated and facing towards him while he read seemed to give him the pleasing illusion of being listened to.
The Sunday of that week-end mattins proceeded at a lagging pace. The morning was already warm. Sun streamed against coloured windows. Lush smells of growth, not yet weary with summer, penetrated into the aisles and mixed with the church smells, cold stone and wood-polish and brass-polish and disturbed dust and Sunday tweeds, too thick for such a day. Mr Bird chanted the prayers lingeringly through his nose, and the choirboys dragged out the Amens as if competing to see who could whine on longest without losing breath. When it came to the psalms the organist played so as not to hurry the congregation, while the congregation waited for the organ to give them a lead. Among the Snailwood pews the extra lethargy of having been up at least till two and in some cases till four or five in the morning seemed to increase the sense of time having sidled so close to eternity that each second could be viewed as in itself endless; but a definite somnolence infected all the congregation, so the “superduperdo” cannot have been wholly to blame. Zena herself sang steadily and earnestly, as if by her sole efforts she was towing the others through a morass of sound in which, without her, they would have become stuck completely.
“… and ever shall be. Amen.”
The stretched vowel of the last syllable was like a sigh of relief. The congregation, apart from Lord Snailwood, sat or slumped. The organ tweedled on while he walked with his twitching stride to the lectern, drew his spectacles from a side pocket and put them on, shut the case with a decisive snap, but then began to leaf impatiently to and fro through the big Bible as if he couldn’t find anything fit to read in it, although he had before the service been up and marked his place with a green embroidered band. At last he settled, clearing his throat as a signal to the organist to stop playing.
“Here beginneth the first verse of the third chapter of the book of the prophet Hosea. Then said the Lord unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lord toward the children of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine.”
It says much for the denaturing power of ritual—assisted in this case by Lord Snailwood’s manner of delivery, jerky and apparently inconsequent though here speaking words provided for him by a far more purposeful character, that even the stimulus of a word such as “adulteress” was insufficient to penetrate the nodding lethargy of his listeners. Only the vicar looked up, hesitated and exchanged a frown of puzzled alarm with his curate, Mr Deller.
“So I bought her to me for fifteen pieces of silver, and for an homer of barley, and an half homer of barley: and I said to her thou shalt abide for me many days.”
Lord Snailwood’s voice was beginning to rise both in pitch and volume.
“Thou shalt not play the harlot. Thou shalt not play the harlot …”
The sentence is not actually repeated in the Authorised Version, but the congregation were used to Lord Snailwood’s tendency to experiment with emphasis as he read, and if dissatisfied to try an alternative. The vicar reached for the shelf by his knee, took out his own copy of the scriptures and searched for the passage being read. Those who were watching him—very few apart from Mr Deller—may by now have realised that something unpredicted was up; the rest dreamed serenely on, though Zena had begun to smile slightly. Finding that the third chapter of Hosea is one of the shortest in the Bible, only five verses, the vicar relaxed slightly but, insofar as he could without seeming to stare, continued to watch his patron with more than ordinary attention. When the Earl plunged on into Chapter Four the vicar scanned rapidly down its nineteen verses, which in no very clear terms denounce the failures of the priesthood as somehow responsible for the whoredoms of Israel. He sat up, now obviously apprehensive, and almost rose to his feet.
“By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood,” proclaimed Lord Snailwood.
For a moment it seemed that he was about to conclude, but the apparent process of closing the book turned out to be only a switch of prophets. Some fifty pages flopped across. The congregation, readying itself to stand for the Te Deum, blinked, at least inwardly, and started to pay definite attention.
“Ezekiel, Twenty-three, Forty,” said Lord Snailwood, gabbling a little with inward excitement and perhaps redder about the ears than usual.
“And furthermore, that ye have sent for men to come from far, unto whom a messenger was sent; and lo they came: for whom thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thy eyes, and deckedst thyself with ornaments. And satest upon a stately bed, and a table prepared before it, whereupon thou has set mine incense and mine oil …”
Once more the vicar consulted his Bible, though no doubt he had at least a vague memory of this juicier and hence more notorious passage.
“And a voice of a multitude being at ease was with her,” read Lord Snailwood. “And with the men of the common sort were brought, Sabeans from the wilderness, which put bracelets upon their hands and beautiful crowns upon their heads. Then said I unto her that was old in adulteries, will they now commit whoredoms with her, and she with them? Yet they went in unto her …”
By now the vicar had made one real movement as if to interrupt, but once again subsided. The whole congregation was paying close attention, if not to the words, at least to the event; so they all saw Sir Charles Archer rise from his place directly beside the aisle, one pew behind where Lord Snailwood always sat, and despite his need to support himself on his stick walk briskly up to the lectern and attempt to close the Bible.
“… unto Aholah and unto Aholibah, the lewd women,” shouted Lord Snailwood, laying his hand upon the page and turning to confront Sir Charles.
“Here endeth the First Lesson,” said Sir Charles calmly. His voice, able to command large public meetings in the open air, was resonant enough to rouse any remaining dozers. Mr Bird and Mr Deller leapt eagerly to their feet, the choir following suit with a rattle of kneelers and the flop of a book or two. The organist, momentarily taken by surprise, produced a wheezing note before managing to drown all other noises with a chord. The congregation rose and announced that they praised God and acknowledged Him to be the Lord, though their eyes were still held by the spectacle of Lord Snailwood and Sir Charles confronting each other at the lectern, until Sir Charles turned and came stiffly back to his pew. After a moment Lord Snailwood followed suit. Mr Bird, singing full blast, crossed the choir and spoke to Mr Deller, who immediately left his place and occupied the lectern, standing there throughout the Te Deum, apprehensive but spiritually prepared to hold his ground in case Lord Snailwood should take it into his head and return to read selected passages from the New Testament, the seventeenth chapter of Revelation being the most obvious choice.
When the congregation sat for the second lesson Zena reached out and patted the back of her husband’s hand, as if he had done something rather clever and amusing, for him. He did not appear to respond.
With the Daimler out of action space was short in the Snailwood cars to carry the party home from church. Normally, though some might walk down the hill, all rode back in order to attend in the courtyard by noon. This Sunday Miss Blaise said she would prefer in any case to walk.
“Then Harry and Vincent can go with you,” said Zena. “Just to make sure you’re in time for the photograph. And the rest of us will simply have to cram in as best we can. Don’t dilly-dally, darlings. Start now.”
She turned to organise the loading of the Sunbeam and her own Vauxhall. Miss Blaise and the cousins took the path that led away from the road and out of the little wicket beside the enclosure where dead flowers from the graves were dumped.
“I’d like to get a move on,” said Harry. “Joan’s in a bit of a stew. Something’s wrong with little Sal, and she’s sent for Dr Hughes.”
“Nip on ahead, Hal,” said Vincent. “I’ll bring Nan.”
“No, it’s all right. I’ll go over the wall at Far Look-out. That’ll save five mins. I say, wasn’t Uncle Snaily on form? Good thing your Sabean wasn’t there from his wilderness, what? Is it actually true he fetched Dolly F-J back from Bullington to dance with him?”
“Didn’t you see them?” said Miss Blaise.
“Oh, for some reason or other I didn’t see much of what was going on after we met you down by the Bloodstone.”
“Dolly was there all right.”
“That lewd woman?”
“Rather! Prince Yasif apologised ever so prettily to Lady Snailwood, but he stuck to Dolly for the rest of the evening and didn’t dance with anyone else. And then they disappeared.”
“I wonder whether that was what stirred Uncle Snaily up to look for dirty bits in the Bible.”
“I saw him glowering at them last night,” said Miss Blaise. “But he seemed to be in a glowery mood. He glowered like anything at darling Prof. Blech, who was making us all so jolly.”
“On the other hand he may have disapproved of my paying so much attention to his wife’s secretary.”
“I thought it was the whole party,” said Miss Blaise. “That bit about the voice of a multitude being at ease, it’s quite right. I noticed it when we went down to listen to the nightingales—what a vulgar noise humans make, particularly when they are enjoying themselves. What’s wrong with Sally?”
“No idea. Measles or something, I should think. She’s that age. Zena won’t approve of uninvited germs, any more than Uncle Snaily approves of invited Jews.”
“I thought yesterday she was rather a sulky-looking kid,” said Miss Blaise. “But if she was sickening for something …”
“Oh, Sally’s rather a good egg underneath. She’s had some painful things happen to her, that’s all. Don’t you think so, Vince?”
“She’ll get over it.”
2
The photograph of the house party was another Sunday morning ritual, as regular as churchgoing and in some ways more solemn.
It was Purser’s demeanour, statelier, more self-confident, more at ease with his minor mysteries than Mr Bird with his major ones, that was responsible for this effect. On wet Sundays chairs and benches would be ranked beneath the cloister arches directly facing the clock tower while Purser manipulated his camera out in the open, under a large golf umbrella held by Robson (always described as Lord Snailwood’s batman though his lordship had never served with any regiment). This was often unsatisfactory, especially for large parties, as the position of the pillars meant that the guests had to line up four or five deep, those at the rear standing on benches, an arrangement which raised their heads into the shadow of the arch and meant that in the finished photograph the faces of the more important guests seemed to be framed against a screen of waistcoats. Experiments with two large old mirrors from the doors of wardrobes, propped to reflect daylight into the upper recesses, effected some improvement.
It might have been thought easier to wait for a break in the clouds, but this would have destroyed an essential element in the ritual. The party assembled at eleven-fifty for the photograph, and when it was over they were rewarded by seeing the clock strike noon. In a mysterious way this had become the climax of the whole week-end. From then on whatever was done or said seemed to be tinged with a note of farewell.
On fine days the problems of lighting were of a different kind, in that the clock faced south, and hence the guests assembled to watch it faced north, and hence the camera pointed directly into the noon sun. It might have seemed sense to arrange the group beneath the tower and then let them turn to watch the spectacle when the photography was over, but Lord Snailwood refused to countenance this on the grounds that it was “a lot of unnecessary fuss”. In some of the earlier photographs the faces of the group were, as a result, almost indecipherable, but Purser had become increasingly skilled at overcoming this difficulty, devising an enormous hood to shade his lens and deploying his two mirrors to useful effect. It was seldom nowadays that anything went wrong, apart from the occasional guest who eluded Zena’s round-up.
It seemed for a while that Prince Yasif might be one of these.
“Honestly,” said Zena, “it’ll be a bit off of him in the circs, after I was so sweet about letting him bring Dolly back here and smooch with her all evening. Harry … Oh, this is too bad! Where’s Harry? Darling Vincent, do run and see if you can find them. Purser! I say, Purser!”
Purser looked slowly up from the brass knob he was tightening on his tripod and gave Zena his cold and incurious stare.
“My lady?”
“Does anyone know if his royal highness left while we were at church?”
“I was in church also, my lady.”
“Somebody must know. Oh, look, there! How super!”
Zena clapped her hands as the Prince strode into the sunlight, looking a little uncertain of his reception. He was wearing Arab dress again, a completely fresh outfit to judge from the sheer whiteness of the linen.
“That will absolutely make the picture,” cried Zena. “Now we must get started. Where’s Harry got to, for heaven’s sake? Come on, everyone. I go in the middle and I’ll have his highness on my right and Charles on my left. Mrs Blech next to the Prince and …”
“No,” said the Prince.
Zena stopped, amazed. It may not have crossed her mind that the seating arrangements for her photograph could have anything to do with the wars and treaties of the world beyond the Snailwood boundary wall, though at other times she spoke as though the games she played in her domain were a vital part of the machinery of that world.
“I have given hostages enough,” said the Prince. “I was doubtful whether I should appear in this photograph, but since you have been so kind to me I consent. Still, it is impossible that I should be seen to sit beside the wife of Professor Blech.”
“You know, he’s quite right, Zena,” said Sir Charles. “It would to say the least be premature. Perhaps the day will come.”
“Oh, do let’s get on,” said Zena. “Snaily, you sit next to his highness. Look, here’s Harry at last. I thought that child was supposed to be ill. Now, where was I? That end Leila, Professor, Marjorie, Ronald. And this end …”
Decisively Zena shooed them into position. Purser crouched beneath the cloak-like black cloth behind the camera, pawing forward with his left hand to settle the focus of the lens. From under the cloister arches to left and right a few people watched the ritual, on one side some of the kitchen servants who had not yet managed to inspect Zena’s latest catch of famous fish, and on the other Mrs Dubigny and the nanny, the latter holding the hand of a sleepy-looking Sally. Behind them, barely visible in the shadows, stood another figure, a man.
Purser emerged, placed the brass cap over the big lens, slid the plate down into its slot in the polished cedar-wood of the camera box, and finally took up a stance of command, one hand on the lens-cap and the other raised for attention.
