The car arrived as I set tea. Amy, elegant as ever in a new suit, emerged with a bunch of daffodils and a new hair style. We greeted each other warmly and I complimented her on her looks.
'Do you like it?' she asked, patting her variegated locks and preening herself.
'Very much,' I answered truthfully. 'I like all those stripes, like a humbug.'
Amy looked at me with distaste.
'Like a humbug!' she echoed disgustedly. 'What a dreadful way of putting it!'
'What's wrong with it?' I asked. 'I'm very fond of humbugs, and those auburn streaks remind me of the treacly ones.'
Amy bit delicately into a sandwich.
'It cost a fortune,' she said sadly. 'And took hours to do, with all the strands sprouting through a bathing-cap affair. I thought James would like it, but he hasn't noticed yet.'
I enquired after James, her husband, and learnt that he was away for the night at a conference in the north. To my mind, James has a suspiciously large number of overnight engagements, but it is no affair of mine, and Amy is wise enough not to discuss the matter with me.
'You know,' said Amy, looking at me closely, 'I think you could take this high-lighting effect. It would do something for you.'
'Now, Amy,' I begged, seriously alarmed, for I have had many a battle with my old friend about my mousy appearance, 'please don't start on me again! I am a plain, shabby, middle-aged woman with no pretensions to glamour. I like being like this, so leave me alone.'
Amy waved aside my pleading and took another sandwich.
'A few glints in your hair, some decent make-up, and a good strong pair of corsets would work wonders for you,' said Amy. 'Which reminds me—I want you to come to the Charity Ball at the Corn Exchange next month!'
'Never!' I cried, with spirit. 'You know I can't keep awake after eleven o'clock. And I don't like dancing. And I haven't got a frock to wear anyway.'
Amy sighed.
'Then it's time you bought one. You simply can't waste the whole of your life in this one-eyed village. You never meet a soul—'
'I do, I protested. 'Every day. I meet far too many souls. There are thirty-odd to be faced every morning.'
'I mean
men,
' snapped Amy with exasperation. 'There's no reason why you shouldn't get married, even at your age, and it's time someone took you in hand and made you see reason.'
'But I don't
want
to get married!' I wailed. 'I should have done it years ago if I'd intended to do.'
'And who,' said Amy coldly, 'ever asked you?'
I began to laugh.
'Well, there was that neighbour of yours who was in a constant state of inebriation and wanted someone to keep him from drinking—'
'You can't count him,' said Amy firmly. 'He asked everyone.'
'I can't think of anyone else at the moment,' I said.
'I can tell you one thing,' said Amy, 'if you take up this attitude, and refuse to mae the Best of Yourself, then you are doomed to be an old maid.'
'Suits me,' I said comfortably. 'Have some more tea.'
Amy stirred her second cup thoughtfully.
'There's still time,' she assured me. 'Look at Elsie Parker. Blundell, I mean. She's managed it.'
'Blundell?' I queried. 'Not the Blundells who are moving to Fairacre?'
Amy looked interested, and ceased stirring.
'It's quite likely,' she said slowly. 'They are having a pair of cottages knocked into one house somewhere or other.'
'It's here,' I assured her feelingly, 'I should know. The children spend most of their time watching the workmen. It was Mrs Pringle who mentioned the name Blundell, only this afternoon.'
'That must be Elsie,' said Amy, 'and her newly-caught husband. Well, well, well! So they're settling in Fairacre!'
Amy produced a beautiful powder box, a present from James after a week away, powdered her nose, and settled back in her chair.
'Well, go on,' I urged. 'Tell me about my neighbours to be!'
And, smiling indulgently, Amy began.
It was generally agreed, in the little village of Bent, that Elsie Parker was an uncommonly pretty girl. She was the only child born to Roger and Lily Parker a year or two after the First World War. Her father returned from his arduous, if undistinguished, duties as an army baker to start afresh as part-owner of a small general store on the southern outskirts of Caxley.
At first, he cycled the few miles to work on a venerable bicycle, but as the business prospered he changed to a small second-hand van with which he began to build up a modest delivery round. People liked Roger Parker. He was hardworking, honest and utterly reliable. If he said that he would bring the pickles in time for Monday's cold lunch, then you could be quite sure that the jar would be with you before the potatoes had come to the boil. He deserved to prosper, and he did.
By the time Elsie was six, the shabby delivery van had been changed for two larger new ones which spent the day touring the district and the night safely locked up in the new shed at the rear of the general stores. Roger now owned a bull-nosed Morris tourer which he drove to work each morning. At the weekends he polished it lovingly and then took his wife and pretty little daughter for a drive.
Elsie was the apple of her parents' eyes. She had a mop of yellow curls, lively blue eyes with exquisitely long curling lashes, and a smile that disarmed even the most curmudgeonly. Needless to say, she was the belle of the infants' class at Bent village school and was accompanied to and from that establishment by a bevy of small admirers.
Her first proposal of marriage came when she was seven. It came from the shabbiest of her escorts, whose nose was constantly wet, despite a rag pinned to his dirty jersey, and whose attentions had long been deplored by Mrs Parker. Elsie turned him down promptly, but gave him one of her heart-turning smiles as she did so, for she was a kind child.
It was an experience which was to occur many times in the future, and as time went on Elsie was to learn many refinements in the art of rejecting a suitor. But, as a first attempt and for one of such tender years, the present rejection was commendable—a blend of firmness and gentleness, lit by a certain light-hearted awareness of an honour received, which many an older maiden could not have bettered. The young man ran ahead to school, and after shedding a few hot tears in the blessed privacy of the boys' lavatory, recovered his good spirits and continued to accompany his goddess as before—without hope, certainly, but also without rancour.
Hard on the heels of this proposal came another, from an urchin almost as disreputable as the first. He too was turned down, and in an unguarded moment Elsie mentioned both incidents to her mother. She was much distressed.
'I can't think why such
dirty
boys like you!' exclaimed poor genteel Mrs Parker. 'You mustn't encourage them, Elsie. It won't do! It really won't do at all!'
If Mrs Parker had been capable of giving the situation a moment's clear thought she would have realised that it was the very difference in her daughter's appearance and nature which acted as a magnet to the rough rumbustious boys. Those glossy curls, the freshly-starched voiles and the enchanting scent of Erasmic soap created a being of such sweet cleanliness that she was well-nigh irresistible to the lesser washed.
'Why don't you play with some of the other boys?' asked Mrs Parker. 'There's Jimmy Bassett and Stanley Roberts,' she went on, naming the firstborn at the flourishing new garage on the main road to Caxley, and the vicar's son who would be going on to his preparatory school next term. Mrs Parker had a nice regard for the social ladder.
'Jimmy lisps,' said Miss Parker, speaking truly. 'And Stanley Roberts dropped a dead rat in old Mrs Turner's well last week,'
'
Stanley
did?' exclaimed Mrs Parker, much shocked. 'The vicar's son? A dead rat?'
'Mrs Turner's chapel,' explained Elsie succinctly.
The matter was dropped.
At the age often Elsie was taken from the village school and travelled daily into Caxley to attend a larger establishment run by some charming and hard-working nuns. She wore a cornflower blue uniform which enhanced the beauty of her colouring and very soon the schoolboys who travelled on the bus with her were jostling for the place beside her. Elsie treated them with happy impartiality, bestowing conversation, smiles and sympathy upon whichever escort had been lucky enough -or rough enough—to gain the seat next to her.
On more than one occasion during her time at the convent school Elsie was drawn quietly aside by one of the sisters and given a few words of mild reproof. It was not fitting, she was told, to be seen at the centre of a crowd of the opposite sex day after day. It gave the school a bad name. She was advised to be polite but distant, kind but not too kind. Dreadful dangers, it was hinted, could attend too great an interest in the male sex.
It was all rather hard on Elsie. She did not encourage the young men, they simply gravitated towards her as wasps to a sun-ripe pear. Her father, made aware of his daughter's attractions by a dulcet word or two from Sister Teresa, decided to take Elsie to school with him in the car and collect her again in the afternoon. But this state of affairs did not last long. It was most inconvenient for Roger to leave the business. Sometimes lacrosse or tennis kept Elsie late, sometimes a half-holiday meant that she was out early. Gradually the arrangement fell through, and Elsie returned to the bus and the adoration of her swains.
At seventeen, still unscathed by love, Elsie left school and began training to be a nurse. She was at a hospital in London but spent as many week-ends as possible at Bent. By now Roger was what is known in the north as 'a warm man.' A wing had been built on to the small four-square house where Elsie had been born, and a field next door had been acquired to ensure future privacy. Roger, who as a young man had voted Liberal, bought his ready-made suits from a Caxley outfitters, and enjoyed mustard with mutton, now helped himself to mint sauce instead, had his suits made in London, and voted Conservative. He worked, if anything, harder than ever, was much respected in Caxley, and continued to give the same never-failing service which had built up the business.
Mrs Parker, too, rose with her husband. Her hopes were centred on Elsie with more concentration than ever before. In London, she felt sure, there must be many eligible bachelors. Elsie could have whomsoever she wanted, of that she was positive, for she was now at her most beautiful and the stimulation of work and life in London had given her added gaiety and poise. At week-ends Mrs Parker combed the neighbourhood for likely young men, and the field next door was transformed into a tennis court, set about with the very latest garden chairs and a dashing swing seat with a canopy and cushions covered in wistaria-entwined cretonne. Delicious snacks were eaten in the gnat-humming twilight, laughter set the tall lemonade glasses tinkling and die young men feasted their eyes on Elsie Parker, cool, adorable and completely untouched by love.
Of course, it was inevitable that when Elsie fell in love the affair would be disastrous. As might be expected, Elsie's heart was first touched by a married man. He was a doctor who visited the hospital, an unremarkable man, running to fat, and so swarthy that he needed to shave twice a day. He had occasion to speak to Elsie, now and again, and had no idea of the emotion which he unwittingly aroused. His presence alone affected Elsie. Her legs trembled, her hands shook, her throat grew dry and her head grew dizzy. She found it almost impossible to take in his orders.
'That Nurse Parker,' the doctor commented to one of his colleagues, 'is practically an imbecile. Talk about a dumb blonde!'
'It's love,' said the other laconically. He was sharper-eyed than most.
'Rubbish!' snorted Elsie's hero, and dismissed the whole conversation from his mind. He had a perfectly good wife, four children, a house with a mortgage, and no intention of getting entangled with a silly chit of a nurse, even if she was as handsome as Nurse Parker.
Elsie's love grew as the months went by, although it was given no encouragement. At week-ends her mother noted the abstracted air, the paler cheek, the slight, but becoming, loss of weight. She longed to be taken into her daughter's confidence, relishing her role as understanding mother, but Elsie said nothing. In an earnest desire to cheer the girl Mrs Parker began to plan a small party for her nineteenth birthday.
'Oh, mum!' protested Elsie, when the project was broached. 'Let's skip my birthday this year. Honestly, I just don't feel like a lot of fuss.'
'You'll thoroughly enjoy it,' said Mrs Parker firmly. 'You've been moping long enough—about what I can't say, though I can guess—and, it's time you pulled yourself together. I'll make all the arrangements.'
'I'd much rather you did nothing,' replied Elsie shortly. She had no energy or time for anything else but her preoccupation with the adored. Her mother, however, was undeterred. Invitations went out, food and drink were ordered, the local dressmaker was summoned to take Mrs Parker's ever-increasing measurements, and one Saturday night in June was appointed as the time of celebration. Scarcely aware of what was happening, Elsie acquiesced listlessly in the plans.
Work at the hospital seemed doubly hard in the warm weather. There was too, an air of profound disquiet hanging over the whole nation, for this was 1939 and the threat of world war came closer daily.
On the day before Elsie's birthday party the weather was close and thundery. Patients complained in their hot crumpled beds, nurses' tempers were short and the doctors' were even shorter. Shortest of all, it seemed, was the temper of Elsie's beloved. He was a sorely tried man. One of his children had mumps, his wife was prostrated with a migraine which could well last a week, his mother-in-law, whom he detested, was advancing plans to make her permanent home with theirs, the cat had been sick in full and revolting view of the breakfast table, and he had had considerable difficulty in starting his car that morning.
On arrival at the hospital he found that one of his cases in the men's surgical ward had developed alarming complications, and it was this that Elsie overheard him discussing with the sister on duty. Elsie was busy sluicing rubber sheets but could hear the beloved voice above the splashing of the water.