An Unsuitable Attachment (15 page)

'Haven't the novelist and the anthropologist more in common than some people think?' said Everard. 'After all, both study life in communities, though the novelist need not be so accurate or bother with statistics and kinship tables. How are you finding the church life here?'

He turned to Rupert, is it rewarding or amusing in any way?'

'Church life?' said Robina. 'What's that got to do with Rupert?'

'He has lately recovered his childhood faith,' Everard explained, 'as I also did some years ago.'

'Goodness—do people do
that
?' said Gervase incredulously.

'Oh, the church here is very pleasant,' said Rupert, seeming a little embarrassed, probably because of the presence of Ianthe and Penelope. 'Penelope is the vicar's sister-in-law,' he added quickly. 'And Ianthe is a canon's daughter.'

There was a short silence, as if in acknowledgement of or tribute to these facts.

'It's the hymns that are the great stumbling block,' Everard went on, 'but really the only thing is to abandon oneself to the words uncritically and let them flow over one.'

'The great translators of the Oxford Movement sitting in their gothic studies,' said Gervase. 'Hymns pouring off the assembly line.'

'Yes,' said Rupert. 'I think we must agree that Keble was not at his most inspired when he wrote the hymn—which we sang at Candlemas not so long ago—beginning, if I remember rightly,

Ave Maria! Blessed maid,

Lily of Eden's fragrant shade . . .'

'But one must imagine the crowded churches in the East End of London,' said Everard, 'and the great processions—not just a few sophisticated Anglo-Catholic intellectuals pondering every word with critical detachment.'

'Personally I should find the endless cups of tea one of the more trying aspects of church life,' said Gervase. 'Women like them, I suppose—do they?' He turned to Ianthe. 'As far as I can gather from my limited field work they seem to be produced on every possible and impossible occasion. And I suppose they always were.'

'Yes, I can still see my mother at the urn.' Rupert smiled reminiscently.

'My Mother at the Urn—what's that? A newly discovered work by one of the minor Pre-Raphaelites?' said Robina. 'Well, I suppose at this point we retire and leave the gentlemen to their port. I know you all want to talk about that Unesco thing,' she added in a slightly threatening tone.

The three women went upstairs to the spare bedroom. Ianthe and Penelope waited while Robina tried various doors. Penelope sat down at the dressing table and tried to do something to her hair.

'Child, your dress has split at the back,' said Robina, coming back into the room.

'Oh, I wonder if there's a needle and cotton anywhere,' said Ianthe helpfully.

'The stuff has frayed and pulled away from the seam,' said Robina. 'I don't think sewing it together would be the slightest use.'

'The dress was rather tight to begin with and now I've eaten too much,' said Penelope despairingly. 'Steak and kidney pudding, baked apples and cream, and Stilton cheese—what can you expect! If only I had a stole or something to cover it up.'

'You could wear my fur jacket,' Ianthe suggested.

'But that would look rude—as if I thought the house wasn't warm enough, which it really is with all that paraffin burning away.'

'You could wear this Indian bedspread as a shawl,' suggested Robina, and even went so far as to pull it off the bed and advance towards Penelope with it.

'I couldn't wear
that,'
she said indignantly. 'He'd recognize it and it would look so odd.'

'I don't think men notice these things,' said Robina comfortingly, 'and that means they won't notice the split seam either.'

They went downstairs and into the drawing room. Penelope was careful to walk to her chair with a sort of sideways movement, so that nobody should see the back of her dress. Very shortly afterwards the men came in, Rupert carrying a decanter of port and a bottle of brandy. Mrs Purry, who looked suitably like a black Persian cat, then brought the coffee in.

'I thought you might like some brandy with your coffee,' said Rupert. 'Or there's port, of course.'

'Brandy for me, please,' said Robina.

'I don't think I will have either, thank you,' said Ianthe. 'I always feel port is really for men and brandy is rather associated with illness or disaster for me.'

Penelope hardly knew which to choose after this, but decided on brandy; she had a vague idea that for women port was a rather low-class drink, since they did not—perhaps could not—appreciate it in the rather ritualistic way that men did.

'You haven't allowed yourselves much time to thrash out the Unesco project,' said Robina vigorously.

'Well, it hardly seemed to need such drastic treatment as thrashing,' said Rupert.

'No,' said Gervase. 'Money has been offered and a very large amount, so it seems best to accept the assignment thankfully. We think we can produce what is wanted between us.'

The men talked on about the project, and the women feeling themselves to be excluded—as perhaps they were—started a conversation among themselves. But such conversations, unless they spring up spontaneously among friends, are usually poor and wretched things. I don't want to be talking to
you,
thought Penelope desperately, trying to appear interested in what Robina Fairfax was saying about a place in West London where she had bought a piece of statuary for her garden at a very reasonable price. Ianthe had gone into a kind of day dream and found herself wondering what John did in the evenings. It was a relief to all of them when at half-past ten Robina got up and declared firmly that they had a long journey and must go now. Everard Bone also remembered his sick wife, perhaps for the first time that evening, and offered to give the Fairfaxes a lift somewhere in his car.

Rupert, left alone with Ianthe and Penelope, found himself heaving a sigh of relief, flopping down into a chair, and suggesting a cup of tea.

'See how influenced by church life I've become,' he said.

Now that he was left alone with the two women, both of whom (he imagined) rather admired him, Rupert felt a sense of power, though there being two of them rather limited the scope of what he could do—cramped his style, he might almost have said. In the end, after the tea had been made and drunk, there seemed nothing for it but to escort them home, leaving Ianthe at her front door and walking the short distance to the vicarage with Penelope.

As he had helped her on with her coat, Rupert had noticed her dress had split at the back, which he found provocative and rather endearing. Had not Sophia been standing on the front steps of the vicarage calling Faustina in, he would have taken Penelope in his arms and kissed her. But she was not to know that he had had this desire, and went into the house with head bent, feeling that she had been a failure.

'Rome —you're welcome to it as far as I'm concerned,' said Mervyn spitefully, the day before Ianthe was due to leave with the party from St Basil's.

'But Rome in the spring, surely that will be lovely,' John protested.

'It's not like Paris, you know. I believe it can be uncomfortably hot. And I'm sure you won't like the food. All that cannelloni—or all those cannelloni, I should say—
very
much overrated.'

'Perhaps Ianthe will stick to spaghetti and ravioli,' said John, mentioning the better known varieties of pasta which English people would probably be familiar with in tinned form.

'Grated cheese on
everything,''
Mervyn went on, 'though it is Parmesan, I'll grant you that. Mother would find it much too rich, I know.'

'Well, it's a good thing she isn't going, then,' said John.

'They tell me you only get that very strong black espresso coffee—not even cappuccino—and the cups are only half full,' Mervyn persisted, so that Ianthe had to protest that she wasn't going to Rome only to eat and drink.

'Of course he goes on like this because he's jealous,' said John, when he and Ianthe were alone, if only he could get away from his mother he'd love to go to Italy.'

'Yes, poor Mervyn, if only he could,' Ianthe spoke perfunctorily, for she was walking away from the library with John who had not left her as he usually did to go to his bus stop. He seemed to be about to ask her something.

'I was wondering if you'd come and have a drink with me before you go home,' he said at last.

'That would be very nice, but surely it's too early for a drink?'

'No—it's half-past five. But perhaps a cup of tea would be better—cosier—if you know of anywhere round here?' He stopped in the middle of the pavement and took her arm.

'There's the Humming Bird,' said Ianthe, naming the café where she sometimes had lunch. It would be the first time she had ever been with John to a place that was part of her own particular world, unless one counted the Ash Wednesday lunchtime service at her uncle's church. But now that she came to think of it she had never been out to any sort of meal with John. There was to her something romantic about the idea of sitting with him in the place where she had so often sat alone, eating a poached egg or macaroni cheese at a shaky little oak table.

'No, we don't do evening meals,' Mrs Harper was saying to an obvious middle-aged civil servant as they entered. 'But I could knock you up a couple of poached eggs or a buck rarebit—how would that do?'

'Shall we have poached eggs?' John asked, as they sat down.

Ianthe hesitated. The eating of eggs together had not figured in the romantic picture, perhaps no actual food had suggested itself. Then she realized that he must be hungry and she felt a pang of that pity which is akin to love.

'Yes, let's have that,' she agreed.

'And cakes and China tea?'

'Yes, lovely.'

Mrs Harper gave Ianthe a piercing look through her pince-nez as she came to take the order. Ianthe felt that some kind of explanation for her presence at this unusual time and with a young man was expected, but did not feel herself capable of providing it.

'Do you want
mille feuilles
?' she asked in a tone of peculiar significance.

'Oh yes, please,' said John. When she had gone away he said to Ianthe, 'You won't forget to send me a postcard of that fountain, will you. The one where you throw the money and wish.'

'No, I won't forget.'

'Will
you
throw a coin in?'

'It depends.' Ianthe hesitated, seeing herself with the parish party. Perhaps it was easier to imagine Sister Dew doing it than Mark and Sophia.

'I wonder what you'll wish for,' John went on, looking at her intently.

Mrs Harper came up to the table with the tea so Ianthe's answer had to be delayed. In any case she did not know what it was to be and took refuge in the business of drawing the cups and the teapot towards her.

'I expect you'll wish
I
was with you—or at least I hope you will,' said John at last.

Poached eggs were placed before them.

'I thought your friend would probably be able to tackle two,' said Mrs Harper cheerfully to Ianthe.

'This is the first meal we've ever had together,' said John when she had gone.

'Yes, I suppose it is, really.'

'We'll have lots more together, won't we. We'll go to Italy together one day, don't you feel it?'

'I don't know,' said Ianthe, confused. 'Perhaps I'll go with Mervyn and his mother and we'll avoid cannelloni and Parmesan cheese,' she added jokingly.

They ate their poached eggs, then John handed Ianthe the plate of cakes.

'I don't think I can eat any more,' said Ianthe.

'You must be in love or something,' said John. 'That's what loss of appetite usually means.'

'I'm not used to eating a meal at half-past five,' Ianthe protested. 'I suppose that's why I'm not hungry.'

'If you're not going to eat those
mille feuilles
,' said Mrs Harper, hovering reproachfully by the table, 'that gentleman over there would like them.'

'Of course it's lovely having tea,' said Ianthe, afraid that she had sounded ungracious. 'I have enjoyed it, John. But now I really must be going. I've still got most of my packing to do.'

'I'll come to the station with you and get your ticket.'

'Oh, but I've got the return half, thank you.'

All the same John insisted on coming with her as far as the ticket barrier, and stood holding her hand while she attempted to say good-bye.

Suddenly he drew her towards him and kissed her.

'Good-bye, darling,' he said. 'I wish I was coming too. Take care of yourself.'

Ianthe hurried on to the escalator and began walking down. At the bottom the warm air blowing about her seemed to increase her agitation. A piece of newspaper was swirled against her legs and she collided surprisingly, almost nightmarishly, with a nun.

What was a nun doing, hurrying in the opposite direction in the rush hour, flashed into her mind as the nun spoke.

'Why, Ianthe Broome, of all people!' she exclaimed. 'Don't you remember me?'

She had an eager shining face and looked happy in a rather frightening way. She was grasping a large man's umbrella.

Ianthe hesitated for a moment, trying to remember.

'Agnes Dalby, isn't it,' she said. 'School, of course. You were in the Upper Fourth when I left.'

'And you were the Head Girl!'

'I didn't know about . . .' Ianthe looked at the black robes.

'My taking the veil?' said the nun, so that she appeared to be joking. Perhaps she had often had to put up this kind of defence Ianthe thought.

People surged forward, nearly knocking them over as a train came in.

'Mustn't keep you,' said the nun, 'and I'm dashing off to St Albans, then supper at the Restful Tray with Mother Josephine.'

She seemed to vanish as quickly as she had appeared, leaving Ianthe to be pushed forward into the train, where she stood in a daze until she found herself sitting down in a seat offered to her by a small boy.

'You looked as if you could do with a sit-down,' said the boy's mother. 'I was watching that nun talking to you—it seems to have given you quite a turn.'

'I was surprised to see her,' Ianthe admitted.