Edwardian Candlelight Omnibus (16 page)

Bernie at the fish-and-chip shop cranked up his new phonograph and soon the tinny, cheeky voice of Marie Lloyd was serenading Stone Lane with Bernie howling in accompaniment.

“My old man said foller ’er van,” roared Bernie.

“And don’t dillydally on the way,” caroled Mrs. Marsh from the kitchen downstairs.

“Off went the van wiv ’er ’ole lot in it,” chirped Alf from the shop.

“An’ I walked behind wiv me old cock linnet,” shrilled Mrs. Battersby from the tenement next door.

“All tergither now,” shouted a trader from the street below, leaning on his handcart. And it seemed as if the whole of Stone Lane suddenly burst out singing:

“But I dillied and dallied,

Dallied and dillied,

Lost me way and don’t know where to roam

Oh, you can’t trust the specials,

Like the old-time coppers

And I can’t find my way ’ome.”

The great winter weight of social humiliation, shame, and chilblains whirled around Polly’s head, rose up like an evil mist, and melted away in the sunshine.

She took her summer dress out of the closet and shook out its folds. It was of navy-and-white-spotted organza with a high-boned collar and long tight sleeves. By the time Polly had placed a jaunty straw boater on top of her golden curls, she had mentally resolved to say something nice to Amy Feathers.
No wonder Amy dislikes me
, thought Polly.
But I don’t care! I’m just going to go on being nice until she likes me
.

What a splendid walk to the City it was. Complete strangers shouted “good morning.” Message boys whistled as they went about their work, and a few stunted plane trees on the Kingsland Road had burst into delicate green leaf.

The working masses who had trudged to work all winter in a scurrying frozen mass now sauntered gaily in the sunshine, the men flourishing and brandishing their walking sticks and twirling their mustaches as if the warmth of the sunshine had transformed them all into the gayest dashing blades.

It was a Dick Whittington City of London. Everything was paved with gold from the very cobblestones to the gilded roof of St. Pauls.

Polly stood on the threshold of Westerman’s, glowing like the morning outside. “Good morning everyone,” called Polly cheerfully, her light clear voice sailing into every dingy corner of the office like a summer song. And “Good Morning, Miss Marsh,” chorused the clerks with surprise, noticing for the first time that the stuck-up Miss Marsh was human after all.

Polly sat cheerfuly down at her typewriter and waited for Mr. Baines. Suddenly, she was overcome with such a longing for the marquis that her hands began to tremble and she put them under the desk. How could she have ever dreamt that she could forget him? She had not cried over his photograph because she remembered her humiliation at the hands of his brother, but because, she realized, she was in love with him and she was jealous.

• • •

Mr. Baines wearily stood just inside his front door, the stained glass checkering his face with myriad squares of colored light. He looked like a particularly miserable harlequin.

“And don’t forget,” Gladys was saying, “to bring home a barrel of oysters from Sweetings. Write it down, now.”

“I don’t need to write it down,” said Bertie patiently.

“Yes, you do! Yes, you do! You forget everything! Just write it down! Just write it down!”

Mr. Baines meekly took out a small notebook and noted down “1 brl ostrs.” Gladys peered over his shoulder, her very curl papers bristling with irritation. “What’s
that
scriggle-scraggle? Write it proper…. Oh here, let
me
do it. I declare you need a keeper. And don’t forget, Mother is coming to dinner and we are making up a four for bridge whether you like it or not.”

“Yes, dear.”

“And here. Let me straighten your tie. I declare if it weren’t for me, you’d go to that office looking like a real ragbag.”

The memory of other fingers straightening his tie swept over Mr. Baines and he closed his eyes.

“And just what do you mean by that expression on your face, Bertie Baines?” shrilled Gladys. “Just what do you mean?”

“I’m tired, my dear.”

“You’re tired!
You’re
tired! Haven’t you any idea of the amount of slaving and scrimping I have to do to see that we keep up a proper appearance? Not that you care for appearances. Ho, no!”

And Mr. Baines opened the door.

And Mr. Baines stood stock-still and stared.

A sea of delicate green flowed from the edge of the Heath all the way to Highgate as the fresh young leaves moved lazily and gently in the warm breeze. The grass rippled and rolled and turned like the fur of some enormous green cat. Forsythia blazed in golden glory beside the garden gate and, on the edge of one of the heavy golden branches, a thrush sang away the memories of the long, dark winter.

On the edge of this other world came the voice of Gladys Baines. “What are you standing there like a tailor’s dummy for?”

Mr. Baines turned around and looked at his wife. He said, “Shut up, you frightful old bag.”

He tilted his hat to one side of his head. He
jumped
over the garden gate.

The startled thrush flew off to look for a more appreciative audience, and Gladys Baines went home to mother.

Lady Blenkinsop sat bolt upright against her lacy pillows, the letter she had just finished reading, lying on the quilt. She reached a thin hand toward it and picked up her cup of coffee instead. After all, she knew every word by heart.

It was from her old school friend, Hester Williams. Lady Blenkinsop had not seen Hester in years and could only remember her as a fat, gossipy schoolgirl, much given to sniggering in corners. The letter was to inform her “dear friend Jennie” that Sir Edward had been seen on numerous occasions escorting a certain Lily Entwhistle. Hester had felt it her unpleasant duty to shadow the couple—“just like Sherlock Holmes!”—and had espied them entering a flat in the King’s Road above a dressmaker’s shop. Diligent inquiries had revealed that Sir Edward was
paying
for the rent of the cozy flat, and Miss Lily, herself, was an erstwhile barmaid from the Potter’s Arms. Hester felt sure that her dear Jennie would know just what to do!

But I don’t know what to do
, thought Lady Blenkinsop sadly.
I might have known last Christmas, but now
…

She looked around the room. The curtains were tightly drawn and the only light came from a roseshaded lamp beside her bed.

She leaned her head back against the pillows and suddenly became aware that the birds were singing and squabbling in the ivy outside.

She moved from the bed with frail, tentative steps and jerked the heavy curtain cord.

With her thin hand at the throat of her lacy negligee, she stared at the sunlit scene laid out in front of her.

The lawns swept down to the edge of the sparkling river. A gaily-painted launch cut a swathe through the perfect mirror of the water, sending little creamy waves lapping against the incredible green of the lawn. Daffodils nodded in the gentle breeze, and pink and white daisies starred the rougher grass near the water’s edge. Two noisy whitethroats chased each other through the graceful, swaying branches of a weeping willow.

Against the garden wall a magnificent horse chestnut held its tall spires of blossom to the warmth of the early sun, and a hawthorn covered with a white sheet of flowers brought memories of the winter blizzards.

Lady Blenkinsop opened the window and the stuffy room was filled with the scent of blossom and the sound of birds and lapping water.

She stood for a long time watching the river and then she turned and rang the bell.

Her lady’s maid, Withers, answered the bell promptly and showed no surprise or indeed any expression at all when her mistress declared her intention of breakfasting downstairs.

Sir Edward Blenkinsop was spearing the last grilled kidney with his fork when his wife marched into the room. He rose and tried to kiss her on the cheek but her very flesh seemed to cringe from his touch.

He rubbed his hands together and tried to voice his surprise at seeing her on her feet. “Well, well, well,” he said and then added for witty emphasis, “yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.”

“The sunshine has made me feel
much
stronger, Edward,” said Lady Blenkinsop pleasantly. “I may even venture out. Perhaps I may even go as far as the King’s Road.”

The veins on Sir Edward’s temples began to throb. “Harrumph… grumph,” he remarked intelligently.

“Perhaps I may even try that dressmaker’s… you know the one. You pay the rent of a little flat there, don’t you dear? A Miss Entwhistle, I believe?”

“Hah, hah, ha! Harrumph,” said Sir Edward.

“Well, let us not fence any longer,” said Lady Blenkinsop, helping herself to toast. “I know all about Lily. I am suing for a divorce.”

Sir Edward burst into intelligible speech. “Ho! Hoity-toity. Pot calls the kettle black, what! People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones, what!”

“And every cloud has a silver lining,” said his wife coldly. “If you do not contest the divorce, dear Edward, I shall pay you an enormous amount of money… more than enough to keep twenty Lilys.”

“Well… all right,” said her husband, getting to his feet. “I only married you for your money anyway.”

“I know.”

“Well, well, well.” Sir Edward turned in the doorway, searching desperately for some splendid last words. He found them. “I never liked you anyway, Jennie, so, yah, yah!”

“Yah, yah to you, too,” said Lady Blenkinsop mildly. “And close the door after you, please.” He did so with a loud bang. Lady Blenkinsop walked to the morning room window and waited until the brougham bearing her husband had clattered down the drive and out of sight.

She gave a great sigh of relief. She was very lucky. After all, it is not every woman who can stand at the window of her home and watch the source of her illness bowling out of her life forever.

A mischievous summer breeze escaped from the countryside and blew past Amy Feathers as she sat at the switchboard.

Winter had gone and with it all her hurt. She felt ashamed of herself. She had been really nasty to Bob Friend. As the long-forgotten smells of summer—fresh grass, leaves, and blossoms—floated past her little nose, she desperately began to wonder if she had been too cold—too cruel.

She had left herself with nothing. She missed his friendly smile, she missed their lunches together, and she could still feel the pressure of his lips on hers.

She must make up for lost time. She, Amy Feathers, would summon up all her small stock of courage and… and… she would wait for him outside the office and ask him to walk her home and pray to God that he would not refuse.

• • •

The Marquis of Wollerton opened one yellow eye that splendid morning and asked his man what the hell he was doing bustling and fussing.

His gentleman’s gentleman replied with the long-suffering expression he had acquired of late that “we were packing his lordship’s clothes, as we were leaving for France.”

“Of course,” said the marquis wearily. He lay back on the pillows and closed his eyes. In the winter of yesterday it had seemed like such a splendid idea—to put the breadth of the English Channel between himself and Polly Marsh.

His gentleman’s gentleman drew the heavy curtains and left, shutting the mahogany door behind him with infuriating gentleness—which is the well-bred servant’s way of screaming.

The marquis swung his feet out of bed and padded to the window. The small patch of garden behind his town house in Albemarle Street seemed to have blossomed overnight. It was like magic! The buds and the young leaves must have been flourishing there under the icy lash of the April storms, but he had never noticed them. In a clear blue puddle in the middle of the lawn, a cheeky family of sooty sparrows were squabbling and splashing. A lilac tree, heavy with blossom, moved gently in the breath of the wind. In a nearby house, some child was laboring over Strauss waltzes and Czerny exercises. How poignant is the stumbling music of the amateur heard from a comfortable distance on a sunny morning in May!

Memories and desire came flooding back: Polly catching the red-hot penny; Polly sweeping out of Brown’s Hotel; Polly lying in his arms in the goldfish pond, her wet hair spreading out like some exotic weed in the green water, while the startled goldfish glinted and flashed.

It suddenly came to him that he was simply not going to be able to forget her or live without her.

He, who was famous for his success with women, had gone about the whole business like a callow youth. He had never tried to woo her; he had merely grabbed. He had let overdeveloped class consciousness cloud the whole affair—he who had never cared before what anyone thought of his actions.

Well, he would wait outside the portals of Westerman’s at closing time like the veriest stage-door Johnny. And he would force her to listen to him. No. That was wrong. He would coax her to listen to him.

He rang the bell. “Browning,” he said to the impassive face of his gentleman’s gentleman, “we are not going to France.”

“Very good, my lord.”

“We are going to endeavor to be married.”

“Indeed, my lord. May I offer you my premature congratulations.”

“You have always the
mot juste
, Browning.”

“Quite, my lord.”

“Will you inform the travel agency that… No, on second thought, I’ll inform them myself.”

“Very good, my lord,” said Browning.

“And Browning, I would like to apologize for my somewhat autocratic behavior during the past few months. I have had many worries.”

“Very good, my lord,” said Browning, again closing the door with an infuriating silence, for, as he confided to the butler downstairs, “Apologies is one thing. Actions is another.” And no one could deny that the long-nosed, white-faced bleeder had been merry hell to work for during the winter.

The marquis was strolling along Piccadilly toward the offices of Thomas Cook and Son when he espied a familiar figure. Lady Blenkinsop was tripping along happily in the sunshine followed by a footman who was burdened with purchases.