VIII
He stopped dead.
Fortunately the sofa faced the fireplace, not the door, so it was impossible for him to know that Aysgarth’s hand was beneath my skirt. All he could see was Aysgarth stroking my hair — a gesture which could have been dismissed as a casual manifestation of affection — and I apparently fidgeting with Aysgarth’s tie. This was certainly curious behaviour but not necessarily either suggestive or compromising. In fact in that appalling moment after my father’s entrance I saw that the scene was not beyond redemption. All we had to do to survive the disaster was remain cool, behave casually and laugh off the apparent intimacy as mere asexual playfulness between old friends.
But Aysgarth leapt to his feet as if he had been caught
in
flagrante,
and to my horror I saw him begin to blush. My father quietly closed the door.
Still no one spoke. I was now so shattered that I could only act instinctively and my instinct was to protect Aysgarth by calling attention to myself. Slipping back into my shoes I wandered to the window, peered vaguely out at the rain and enquired: ‘Was the fête washed out?’
The diehards adjourned to the marquee but I thought I’d come home.’ My father’s voice was as idle and untroubled as my own. Pleasantly he added: ‘You’ll excuse us, Aysgarth, but I’d like a word with Venetia in private.’
‘Yes, of course, my Lord,’ said Aysgarth fatally, and walked out. He had not called my father ‘my Lord’ since the accession to the Deanery six years before.
The door closed again. I went on watching the teeming rain and at last I became aware that my father was watching it too. He was standing beside me with his hands in his pockets.
We
were about four feet apart.
‘I wanted to have a word with you,’ he said, ‘about your mother’s seventieth birthday next month. I’ve decided to give a little family dinner-party for her at Lord North Street. I did think of having it down here — much nicer to be in the country in August — but Harold and Amanda can only stop in London for twenty-four hours en route from Turkey to America. Apparently Harold has to go to Washington that weekend. I can’t imagine why.’
‘Curious.’
‘Very. Anyway, the big question is: what will you children give her as a present? Oliver’s organising the matter — you’d better have a word with him. There’s been talk of a silver rose-bowl.’
‘Super! Asprey’s or Garrard’s?’
‘I doubt if Oliver’s got that far yet. But the point’s this, Venetia: make sure you’re up in town on Saturday the twenty-fourth of August or Ill be very cross.’
‘Wild horses wouldn’t keep me away.’
‘Good. By that time, of course,’ said my father as we continued to gaze at the rain, ‘you may well have become a little tired of Starbridge. The city has its charms, I quite see that, but when all’s said and done ... well, it really is a trifle provincial.’
I said nothing.
The rain drummed on and on against the long slim Georgian window.
‘Nevertheless,’ said my father mildly, ‘I’m sure it’s been an interesting interlude for you. I admit I was cross when you left home, but now I see it’s been all for the best.’
After a moment I said cautiously: ‘Oh?’
‘Yes, I was stupid not to see that straight away. In fact I can see now I behaved very stupidly, throwing scenes and taking umbrage. Only the other day your mother called me a very stupid man and said I had only myself to blame if you didn’t write to me.’
‘Mama said that?’
‘I can understand your surprise. That was, of course, most uncharacteristic behaviour on your mother’s part as she’s re- nowned for her placid nature and affectionate disposition. But the other day she spoke her mind. About you. Most interesting. Made me think a bit, I can tell you. Felt quite chastened afterwards.’
‘Good heavens. How very remarkable.’
‘Yes, wasn’t it? "You stupid man!" she stormed at me. Me!
Stupid!
I nearly had apoplexy. Then I had to face the ghastly truth: she was right. I’ve been very, very stupid all my life about women. Never understood them. Closed book. My mother died young and I had no sisters. Eton — Oxford — all-male establishments ... Emerged brilliantly accomplished and a complete fool. Most extraordinary paradox. Suppose it must happen quite often. Very hard for the wives, though. And the daughters.’
He began to roam around the room and after a moment he exclaimed: ‘What a wonderful stroke of luck it was that your mother agreed to marry me! I wasn’t even heir to the title then, just a younger son and so very stupid — how brave it was of her to take me on! I knew nothing about women, nothing at all. My father — all that drink — all those mistresses — disgusting! I was so ashamed ... And then my brother dying of — well, I can’t tell you what that was like, no words could describe the horror, particularly at the end when his brain rotted. So I always said to myself: bloody women, do without them, live like a monk. But then I met your mother, so comfortable, so ordinary, so nice-natured, so SAFE, and it occurred to me I was really very miserable living like a monk, so .. .
‘How your mother put up with me I don’t know. Miracle. Anyway, we wound up very happy and the boys came and then the girls and our family was complete. It was complete after Arabella, as a matter of fact — two boys and two girls, that was exactly what we wanted — but then Sylvia turned up unexpectedly. Not that I minded. I liked my girls, nice little bits of fluff, pat them on the head regularly, tell them how pretty they were — easy. But your mother was much put out by a fifth pregnancy and said afterwards:
"No more."
Well, I quite understood. "Don’t want any more," I said. "I’m quite happy.
Two sons and three little bits of fluff. Marvellous." But you know, Venetia, it wasn’t so marvellous. In fact as time passed it really wasn’t so marvellous at all.’
My father had paused by my writing-table and as I slowly turned to look at him I saw him start to fidget with the edge of the blotter. ‘Of course,’ he said, not looking at me, ‘I was proud of my boys, fine little fellows, and I was devoted to my three bits of fluff, pretty little things, but as they all grew older none of them shared my interests and I still had no one to talk to. I didn’t admit to myself that I was disappointed, but your mother knew, and when I finally went through an exceptionally glum patch — the forties can be a very depressing time — she said to me: "I can’t stand you mooching around like this — take me somewhere beautiful like Venice for a holiday!" I said: "I don’t like Abroad." That maddened her. "You beastly, selfish man, thinking of no one but yourself!" she cried. "What about me? I’d love to see Venice!" So off we went and at first I sulked but soon I found it all most interesting and in the end we had a whale of a time, the best time we’d had since our honeymoon, and when I returned to London I felt fit to burst with high spirits. And then .. .
‘Well, you know what happened. I said aghast to your mother when she told me: "I’m dreadfully sorry — I know you didn’t want any more," and she laughed and laughed — oh, how she laughed! Then she said: "You silly man, do you think I didn’t plan it all right down to the special four-poster bed?"
‘What a woman! I was so grateful to her and so excited and I kept thinking: this’ll be the one, this’ll be it, Latin and Greek prizes galore, intelligent conversation, the comfort of my old age. Then you came.
‘Well, I was disappointed, wasn’t I? I was such a very stupid man, and the stupidest part of all was that I didn’t realise how stupid I was being. All I could see was that there you were, just like me, but the wrong sex. No good. First of all I wanted to write you off Then I found I couldn’t write you off, I couldn’t bear it, it seemed such a waste, so I decided to overlook the fact that you were a girl, pretend you weren’t, and push you towards the best possible education – you couldn’t go to Eton but at least you could go up to Oxford and be a pseudo-boy following in my footsteps. And that, incidentally, was when I got interested in promoting the cause of higher education for women; what I was actually interested in was converting women into pseudo-boys.
‘I never stopped to think, did I? I never stopped to say to myself: Venetia’s not a pseudo-boy, she’s a girl. Such a mistake, because as your mother pointed out to me the other day, you’ve always resented me for not accepting you as you are. Very wrong of me, not fair to you, but now, thanks to your mother screaming out all those home truths when I moaned about you not writing to me, I finally understand what’s going on. You’re a girl and you want to get married; you want to have a husband, children, a nice home, all that sort of thing. Not much good having brains if you wind up an old maid. The way of the world. Not the way things ought to be, perhaps, but when one gets down to the hard facts of life, that’s the way things really are.
‘So,’ said my father, having mangled the top sheet of the blotter into a crumpled heap, ‘I now hear from various reliable sources – your mother and her Starbridge grapevine – that Canon Hoffenberg has been paying his respects, and perhaps this is the moment when I should state unequivocally that I’ve recovered from the First and Second World Wars. Can’t keep hating Germans for ever. The Christians always behave as if they have a monopoly on forgiveness, but they haven’t – there are times when forgiveness is a moral duty for everyone, and although I’m not religious,’ said my father, finally abandoning the writing-desk and wandering back to the window to inspect the rain, let no one say that I’m not a deeply moral man.’
He paused to gaze at the sodden garden before adding: ‘I like Hoffenberg. Good brain. Pleasant fellow. Successful in his field. Nothing much to look at, of course, but then neither was your mother – by which I mean that if you’re like me (and you are) you’ll want to feel SAFE with a good companion, not tormented by a thorough bad lot. So what I’m saying is, Venetia, to put the matter in a nutshell, if you wanted to go ahead with Hoffenberg, I wouldn’t stand in your way, quite the reverse, I’d be very pleased. I shouldn’t have been so prejudiced against him earlier, I can see that now. I should have said to myself: if Aysgarth rates him a capital fellow, he’s got to be all right.’
There was a pause while he fingered the hem of the faded velvet curtain. Then he said vaguely: ‘I worry about Aysgarth sometimes, stuck with that bloody awful wife. If he were a layman there’d be no difficulty; he’d keep a nice little bit of fluff somewhere and everyone would live happily ever after, but clergymen can’t afford to keep little bits of fluff. Clergymen can’t afford to keep anything except their heads. Very dangerous, losing your head if you’re a clergyman. Aysgarth’s a clever man, one of the cleverest men I’ve ever met, but unfortunately even clever men have their blind spots,
as
your mother knows all too well.’ He hesitated. The rain continued to drum against the pane. Then as he peered down at the velvet hem in his hand I heard him say indistinctly: ‘Sorry I’ve always been such a bloody fool, Venetia. Damn stupid. But I swear all I want now is your happiness. Remember that.’
In the long silence that followed he stopped inspecting the curtain and very slowly turned to face me, but when he saw the tears streaming down my face he was quick to act. He exclaimed surprised: ‘Silly little thing! What’s all that for?’ and gathered me clumsily in his arms.
IX
Making an enormous effort I pulled myself together. There are some things which one just should not do in the presence of an elderly parent devoted to the art of maintaining a stiff upper lip, and my father was already intensely flustered. He was muttering: ‘There, there!’ and patting me gingerly on the back as if I were a baby suffering from a troublesome case of indigestion. His tweed jacket smelled of tobacco and mothballs and that vague aroma of sketchily-washed male which is so pervasive among Englishmen brought up in the days when bathrooms were uncomfortable ice-boxes. His body, ramrod stiff, exuded an agonised fright. He really was, as he had so bravely confessed, quite hopeless with women.
‘So sorry,’ I said at last, using the cuff of my cardigan to wipe my eyes. ‘Slightly overcome. Temporary aberration. Nothing to worry about.’
We parted.
‘You’d better go and wash your face,’ said my father. ‘It looks an awful mess and I don’t like that black stuff around your eyes at all. Oh, and deal with Aysgarth, would you? I know the poor fellow can’t help being a draper’s son, but sometimes these self-made men really have no idea how to behave.’
‘Leave him to me.’
The conversation closed. My father collapsed on the sofa to recover while I staggered away to the bathroom to wash my face. I spent some time re-applying my make-up. Then I went to Aysgarth’s room and knocked on the door.
It flew open. ‘Venetia —’ He was distraught. His hair swooped wildly over his ears as if he had raked it over and over again with his fingers. His bright eyes were clouded with anxiety, anguish, even terror. He could barely speak.
‘Yes, yes, yes,’ I said soothingly, setting him aside so that I could slip into the room and close the door. ‘It’s all right. It never happened.’
He stared at me without comprehension.
‘Just act as if it never happened,’ I said patiently as if I were instructing a small child, ‘and everything will be fine.’
‘But I don’t understand — what on earth did he say?’
‘He rambled on about Mama’s coming birthday and indulged in a long sentimental reminiscence about how wonderful she was.’
‘But what did he say about me?’
‘Oh, he implied you were wonderful too. He said you were one of the cleverest men he’d ever met.’
‘But my dear Venetia —’
‘Oh, can’t you see it doesn’t matter? You’re his friend and he’ll stand by you! All you have to do now is chat about the classics to him as usual — and for God’s sake stop calling him "my Lord".’
He stood there, as baffled as if I had spoken in a foreign language, and groped for the words to express his feelings. ‘But if I’d been him — and if you’d been Primrose —’
‘But that’s the whole point,’ I said exasperated. ‘He’s Ranulph Flaxton and I’m Venetia. We’re different.’
Light finally dawned. ‘Ah yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, I see.’ And he looked around the room as if he were trying to work out how he had arrived there after his long, long journey from the small town in Yorkshire where his father had kept a shop.
‘Here,’ I said, trying to help him along. I picked up his hairbrush from the dresser. ‘Tidy yourself up a bit. You look like an eccentric scientist.’ - He accepted the brush without a word, smoothed his hair and straightened his tie.
‘Fabulous!’ I said encouragingly. ‘Now off you go. We can’t talk in private again this weekend, of course. Everything will have to wait.’
‘But when I drive you back to Starbridge —’
‘Oh, that’s impossible now. I’ll have to stay on and get the train back on Monday.’
Again he seemed nonplussed. ‘But you’ll still meet me,’ he said painfully, ‘on Wednesday?’
‘Of course!’
‘And you’ll keep writing?’
‘Reams. Oh Neville, do stop asking these idiotic questions! Just go and have a nice bright chat with my father about Livy or Plutarch or Xenophon or Tacitus or —’
He nodded and stumbled away.