Au Reservoir (2 page)

So it was that Lucia’s occasional visits to Riseholme now took the form of staying at the Ambermere Arms and walking repeatedly around the village green in the hope of being recognised and greeted as the long-lost friend that she was. When passers-by resolutely declined to accord her such recognition, despite her fixed smile of long-lost friendly greeting, she sat outside the Hurst on a canvas stool, sketching her former home while looking sad yet winsome. Once she had exhausted the dramatic possibilities afforded by sadness and winsomeness she returned to Tilling. Politeness to one’s audience therefore made it necessary to employ a little dramatic licence to embellish what might understandably, but misleadingly, appear a somewhat drab episode in an otherwise rewarding existence.

‘And what of dear Mr Georgie?’ Elizabeth Mapp-Flint enquired.

‘Up in town, Elizabeth, with Olga Bracely,’ Lucia enlightened her as Mr and Mrs Wyse joined the party, Mr Wyse raising his hat and bowing gravely. ‘The opera once or twice, I believe, and an exhibition at the Royal Academy. They did press me to join them, of course, but sadly it just wasn’t possible given my busy schedule.’

‘Not too busy for Riseholme, though?’ Mapp pointed out.

Lucia sighed deeply.

‘I could just fit in one, but not both, and I thought I should not be selfish. Of course I would have loved to sit at Covent Garden and listen to Olga, but then I would have had to disappoint all my old friends in Riseholme, and that would have been very hard for them to bear.’

The truth of the matter was that Lucia’s visit to Riseholme had been born of a certain mixture of boredom and desperation; she had felt strangely restless with Georgie away from Mallards, not that she would ever have admitted this to anyone, least of all to Georgie.

‘Just think,’ Diva marvelled, ‘of Mr Georgie sitting there in the royal box surrounded by all sorts of glamorous people – and going somewhere for dinner afterwards, I shouldn’t wonder.’

Lucia waved a deprecating hand.

‘He doesn’t
always
sit in the royal box, of course. Only when the King isn’t there.’

They all looked at Mapp, rather startled, as from the back of her throat there came a little snarling noise.

‘Though of course,’ Lucia went on smoothly, ‘Georgie is no stranger to royal company.’

Uncertain glances were exchanged. It was true that Georgie wore with his evening dress (‘hitum’ in Lucia’s social patois) a dashing order of Albanian knighthood, and there were rumours – on which he modestly refused to comment – that he had been given it by a grateful king whose life he had once saved. However, given Georgie’s well-known interest in needlepoint, this startling evidence – if evidence it be – of a secret existence as a man of action was treated with varying degrees of scepticism, ranging from ‘Pshaw!’ from the Major to a grave bow on the part of Mr Wyse, usually in the general direction of Bellagio, where the anti-regicidal services in question were said to have been performed. Since both had actually been present at roughly the time the events in question were supposed to have taken place, surely even the eternally accommodating Mr Wyse was entitled to entertain certain doubts on the matter.

‘Ah, yes,’ said Diva non-committally.

‘Surprised you didn’t go yourself, dear,’ Mapp ventured, with her head to one side, ‘if Mr Georgie was going to be meeting lots of famous people. Why, you might be in the society pages again and have lots of cuttings to put in your scrap book. So nice, I always think, to leave them lying around at Mallards so … comfortably.’

The pause made clear, as it was intended to, that she had been on the verge of saying ‘ostentatiously’ but had been prevented from doing so by her natural good manners. Unfortunately the effect of this narrowly avoided social solecism was somewhat lessened by her next dart, which was to prove the old adage that one should never take aim at two targets at once.

‘
Comoda
, isn’t it, dear, in your lovely Italian?’

Even as she uttered the word, Mapp felt a flash of uncertainty and cursed herself for having been unable to refrain from attempting to administer a particularly effective
coup de grâce
, rather than simply walking off, leaving her victim seriously wounded. Mr Wyse’s immediate glance of surprise and distress to his wife confirmed her fears.

‘
Comodo
, actually, Elizabeth,’ Lucia purred. A shame indeed that Georgie was not present, she reflected, since he always said that it was such fun to be able to speak a language just well enough to correct other people’s mistakes.

‘I was of course employing the female form,’ Mapp countered.

‘Really, dear?’ Lucia replied, arching her eyebrows.

Mr Wyse remained resolutely silent. He already found the idea of a commode quite disturbing enough without it being linked in his mind with the female form. He recalled a boyhood visit to an elderly aunt in Godalming, and shuddered inwardly.

‘Stick to English, I should,’ Diva broke in, lapsing into her customary telegraphese. ‘Much better all round.’

‘Like the dragon,’ Mr Wyse proffered suddenly, rousing himself from his reverie. ‘Though with a ‘k’ of course. Why yes, I remember a crossword clue last week about a comfortable reptile.’

There was the customary pause to digest this, since Mr Wyse usually said such terribly clever things. The pause gave the redoubtable Elizabeth Mapp-Flint an opportunity to reload and fire another volley.

‘Perhaps Mr Georgie will be seeing that nice Noël Coward, as he is such a good friend of yours?’ she enquired innocently. ‘Goodness, now I come to think of it what a pity that you’ve never invited him to stay at Mallards. Why, I can just imagine the two of you sitting there at the piano playing Mozartino duets.’

‘Dear Noël,’ Lucia said dreamily. ‘Such a great talent and yet what a lovely man – so unaffected, you know.’

‘Such a shame, then, dear one, that you haven’t been able to entice him down for the weekend,’ Mapp pushed on, sensing victory.

‘Yes, isn’t it?’ Lucia cried. ‘It would indeed be wonderful, as you say, Elizabeth, but sadly the poor man is so busy he hardly knows what day of the week it is most of the time. Why, he told me as much in his last letter.’

There came the hiss of a collective sharp intake of breath. The story of Noël Coward’s curt dismissal had of course been widely disseminated (Elizabeth had felt it no less than her duty, painful though it was to suggest that Lulu might not be entirely truthful).

‘His letter?’ Elizabeth echoed. ‘Was that the one in which he told you to leave him alone?’

Lucia gave one of her little silvery laughs.

‘Elizabeth, dear,’ she said, elongating the name playfully. ‘You really must learn to read other people’s letters more thoroughly.’

There was another group gasp.

‘Darling Noël is so temperamental that he has spats with all his friends on a regular basis. Why he wrote to me a few days later to apologise most charmingly and say that he was so taken up with writing his new play that he sometimes forgot to whom he was writing halfway through a letter. “But I just put it in the envelope, send it anyway and hope for the best,” he said. So like him, don’t you think?’

‘No idea, I’m sure, dear,’ Elizabeth said venomously. ‘After all, we don’t know him as well as you do, do we?’

Lucia was rapt in thought and therefore able simply to ignore this impious riposte.

‘Let me see,’ she said, weighing her words judiciously, ‘did he mention Georgie’s visit in his last letter? No, it’s no good, I simply can’t remember. Perhaps they will be able to get together and perhaps they won’t. After all, in London society so much happens spontaneously, you know. Why I remember one day Babs Shyton –’

She cut herself off abruptly and raised a gloved hand to her mouth, clearly signalling that she recognised that she had been about to divulge something terribly scandalous to which only a small and highly select social group were privy.

It was time to turn towards Mallards and make a gracious exit, and turn towards Mallards and make a gracious exit she duly did, waving that same gloved hand and bestowing upon her friends a serene but slightly mischievous smile that was all her own.

‘Goodbye, dear ones,’ she called as she departed the scene, an almost tangible curtain falling as she did so.

‘Au reservoir.’

L
ate that same evening Olga and Georgie arrived at Sheekey’s and swept through the door to the usual burst of spontaneous applause from the assembled diners, most of whom had come straight from the Royal Opera House where they had thrilled to Olga’s
Walküre
. Lucia would doubtless have savoured the moment to the full, murmuring, ‘
Grazie tante
,’ and allowing a regal smile to play around her lips. Olga simply shouted, ‘Evening, everybody!’ before seizing the manager in a firm embrace and demanding a glass of champagne before she expired.

‘Always such a pleasure to see you, Miss Bracely,’ said that worthy gentleman, while attempting to disentangle himself. ‘You have a reservation, of course?’

‘Don’t be silly, Alfredo,’ she hooted, ‘when do I ever make a reservation?’

Alfredo gestured rather helplessly at the full restaurant.

‘Perhaps if you take a seat in the bar for a few moments …?’ he ventured.

‘All right, you old rascal, but mind you don’t keep us waiting long – I’m famished.’ Then, releasing the manager but only in order to take a firm hold of Georgie’s arm, ‘This is Mr Pillson, by the way, Alfredo, an especially good friend of mine.’

Alfredo pretended to remember Georgie, which the latter found very gratifying. The crowd of people around the bar parted as if by magic as Olga approached and two empty bar stools materialised. Like an ocean liner she seemed to create her own bow wave, which swept lesser vessels majestically but beautifully to either side.

Two glasses of champagne appeared equally quickly and mysteriously.

‘Oh, Olga!’ breathed Georgie in rapture. ‘This is simply wonderful. To be here, with you, and to have listened to you singing that wonderful music.’

‘Georgie, darling,’ replied Olga, ‘you know that it’s the biggest thrill in the world for me to see you too.’

She leaned forward and kissed him lightly on the lips, which took him so totally by surprise that it was like suddenly being in the presence of an immensely bright flash of light. As much as surprising, Georgie found it distinctly exciting in a very unaccustomed sort of way, as well as highly embarrassing, since various people around them said ‘Ah!’ and started clapping.

He tried to adopt the expression of a sophisticated man of the world who was kissed publicly by glamorous women several times an evening but, still unsettled by the experience, found himself overbalancing and only just managed not to fall straight off his bar stool, which would have been very tiresome indeed.

‘Now, tell me all about Lucia,’ demanded Olga, as he tried wriggling his posterior from side to side in an effort to squirm back into an upright position. However, as he teetered precariously he ended up doing something very painful on the edge of the stool, let out an involuntary gasp and had to put a foot down on the floor. As he blinked back the tears that sprang unbidden to his eyes, he struggled to reply to Olga and at the same time scramble back into position again, trying to look as unconcerned as possible, as if he fell off bar stools on a regular basis.

‘Oh, Olga,’ he protested as he did so, ‘do we really have to talk about Lucia? I’d much rather talk about you and what you’ve been doing, and what your plans are, and –’

At this point he was interrupted by the manager, who informed them that a table had just become free. The bar waiter picked up their glasses to carry them into the next room. Strangely, all the other people who had been waiting for tables much longer than they had did not seem to mind this at all.

‘Oh gosh, Alfredo,’ Olga said, suddenly stopping at the door of the bar, ‘did I mention that I needed a table for four? I’m hoping that a couple of friends can join us. I didn’t? Oh, I’m sorry. How wretched of me.’

Alfredo gave a heavy sigh and returned them to their bar stools, their glasses of champagne also making a welcome reappearance.

‘But Lucia is such enormous fun,’ said Olga, continuing their conversation as if nothing had happened. ‘She is one of life’s truly remarkable characters. I sometimes believe that if she did not exist we would have to invent her. Everything she does is on an epic scale and she endows it all with such drama and grandeur that one can only stand back and admire.’

‘I don’t know about that,’ Georgie demurred. ‘What about that time you dressed up as a member of the choir to sing carols with them, and she said afterwards that one of them had stood out above all the others and sung out of tune?’

‘Now, now, Georgie,’ she chided, ‘anybody can make a mistake.’

‘And talking of mistakes,’ he continued unabashed, ‘what about the time she mistook Schubert’s cradle song for
Lucrezia
?’

‘Ah,’ Olga countered in triumph, ‘but then, as she pointed out herself, she was listening from outside the window.’

At this both fell victim to a paroxysm of mirth, which threatened to dethrone Georgie from his precarious perch once more. Happily, Alfredo intervened and led them to a table for four, handily situated in full view of the door. Hardly had they been handed the menus when two distinguished-looking gentlemen came through the door, recognised Olga and came straight over. Georgie thought they both looked familiar but could not quite place them.

‘Olga, my sweet,’ murmured the first, taking his cigarette out of his mouth to kiss her tenderly on each cheek.

‘Noël, how lovely to see you!’ shrieked Olga. ‘I’m so glad I could get a table – and Johnnie too, what a treat!’

‘The treat is all mine, my dear,’ said the other rather wearily.

They both looked at Georgie, and Olga grabbed his arm.

‘This is my very special friend, Georgie Pillson,’ she informed them. ‘You must have heard me talk about him dozens of times. He’s just up from Tilling, and came to see my Brünnhilde at the House.’

They all shook hands, with both the newcomers nodding ‘Charmed’ in Georgie’s direction.