Quartet in Autumn (7 page)

'That is clear, then?' she declared, the chairman closing the meeting. 'Mr Olatunde will be your landlord from the Michaelmas quarter day.'

Afterwards there was talk on the stairs as the tenants went back to their rooms.

'We must remember that until very recently Nigeria was British,' said Miss Spurgeon. It was pink on the map. In some old atlases it still is.'

Letty felt that with the way things were going nothing was pink on the map any more. That night, as she lay in bed finding it difficult to sleep, the whole of her life seemed to unroll before her like that of a drowning man ... is said to do, she thought, for of course her experience did not extend to drowning and it was unlikely that it ever would. Death, when it came, would present itself in another guise, something more 'suitable' for a person like herself, for where would she ever be likely to be in danger of death by drowning?

'It never rains but it pours,' said Norman the next morning when Letty had told them in the office about the new development in her retirement plans. 'First your friend getting married and now this — whatever next? There'll be a third thing, just you wait.'

'Yes, troubles do tend to come in threes, or so people say,' Edwin remarked. There was of course an undeniable interest and even unadmitted pleasure in the contemplation of other people's misfortunes, and for a moment Edwin basked in this, shaking his head and speculating on what the third disaster might be.

'Don't tell us you're getting married too,' said Norman jauntily. 'That might be the third thing.'

Letty had to smile, as she was meant to, at such a fantastic suggestion. 'No chance of that,' she said. 'But I can still go and live in the country if I want to. There's a nice house in the village where I could get a room'

'An old people's home?' Norman asked, quick as a flash.

'Not exactly — you can have your own furniture there.'

'An old people's home where you can have your own furniture — your bits and pieces and treasures,' Norman went on.

'Of course you won't necessarily have to leave your room in London,' said Edwin. 'The new landlord may be a very good man. A lot of splendid West Africans come to our church and they do very well in the sanctuary. They have a great love of ritual and pageantry.'

This was cold comfort to Letty, for it was these very qualities that she feared, the noise and exuberance, all those characteristics exemplified by the black girl in the office which were so different from her own.

'Oh, she'll find their way of life so different,' said Norman, 'the cooking smell and that
.
I know about bedsitters, believe me.'

Marcia had so far contributed nothing to the discussion for there was a fear in her mind, even if it was not a very strong one, that she might have to offer Letty a room in her house. After all, Letty had always been kind to her; she had once offered to make her a cup of tea before going home, and even though the offer had not been accepted it had not been forgotten. But this did not mean that Marcia was under any obligation to provide accommodation for Letty in her retirement For of course it would be impossible - she couldn't have anybody else living in her house. Two women could never share the same kitchen, she told herself, forgetting for the moment that she never really used the kitchen except to boil a kettle or make a piece of toast. Then there would be the difficulty of the store cupboard where Marcia kept her collection of tinned foods, and the special and rather unusual arrangement she had about milk bottles, not to mention the use of the bathroom and the arrangement of personal washing — the difficulties were insuperable. Women alone had to make their own way in the world and no doubt Letty already knew this. And if she couldn't cope there would be somebody like Janice Brabner coming round, asking personal questions, making stupid suggestions and inviting her to do things she didn't want to do. It certainly wasn't Marcia's duty to offer a home to Letty, just because she had a house of her own and lived by herself. Indignation welled up inside her, and she asked herself, why should I? But there was no answer to this question because nobody asked it
.
Nobody had even thought of it, let alone Letty herself.

'I'll wait and see what happens,' she said sensibly. 'After all, one doesn't want to go looking for new accommodation in August
.
It's not a very good time.'

'August is a wicked month,' said Norman, who had seen the phrase somewhere.

Not wicked so much as awkward, Edwin thought August 15th — Feast of the Assumption, Solemn Mass 8 p.m. There might not be the full complement of servers, even with the splendid West Africans, and people were disinclined to attend an evening Mass at the end of a hot summer day. You'd have thought Rome would have chosen a more convenient time. But the Doctrine of the Assumption had been proclaimed about 1950, he believed, and church life in the Italy of twenty years ago was no doubt rather different from present-day practice in England in the seventies, even in a High Anglican church, where most of the population didn't go to church anyway and those that did might well be away on holiday. Some people thought Father G. went rather too far — 'way out' — in observing some of these so-called obligations, but of course Edwin would be there this evening, among the two or three gathered together, and that was the main thing.

'I may get on very well with Mr Olatunde,' Letty was saying, in a bright, brave tone. I certainly shan't do anything in a hurry.'

Seven

J
ANICE
ALWAYS
HAD
to nerve herself before going to see Marcia again. She wasn't like the other old ladies she visited, in fact the term 'old lady' didn't seem to describe her, yet she wasn't eccentric in a quaint or lovable way either. But there were always people like this — one had to regard it as a challenge, to try to get through to Marcia, to understand what went on in her mind.

Janice decided to choose Saturday morning rather than an evening for her next visit. People who worked were usually in on Saturday morning and with some, though not with Marcia, there might be the chance of a cup of coffee if one chose a suitable time. Still, she did open the door and that was something.

'How have things been with you?' Janice asked, stepping into the hall uninvited, but one must 'gain access', that was very important. 'Have you been managing your housework all right?' The dust on the hall table told its own story and the floor looked grey and gritty. Real nitty-gritty, Janice smiled at the fancy. But of course one mustn't smile — how
had
she been coping? She wished Marcia would make some remark, however trite, instead of staring at her in that unnerving way. There was a shopping basket on a chair in the hall. This could be a talking point and Janice seized on it with relief.

'I see you've been shopping.'

'Yes. Saturday is my shopping day.'

This at least was encouraging, that she had a shopping day, just like any other woman. But what had she bought? Nothing but tinned food, it seemed. A word of tactful criticism and friendly advice was needed here. Fresh vegetables, even if only a cabbage, would be better than processed peas, and apples or oranges than tinned peaches. She ought to be able to afford suitable food, but perhaps she didn't want to eat sensibly, that was the annoying and irritating thing about the people one went to see. But of course she had been in hospital; she was still 'under the doctor, as the expression was. Didn't he ever enquire into her diet?

'I always like to have plenty of tinned foods in the house,' Marcia said in a rather grand manner when Janice tried to suggest that fresh food would be better for her.

'Oh, yes, of course. Tins are very useful, especially when you can't get out or don't want to go to the shops.' No point in going on to somebody like Marcia who obviously wouldn't be led or advised by anyone. Janice was getting to know that she was the kind of person one mustn't interfere with but just keep an eye on. It would be better not to make any comment on the housework or lack of it. Some people didn't like doing housework, anyway.

'Goodbye, then,' she said. 'I'll pop in again some time.'

When she had gone Marcia took her shopping bag to unpack it in the kitchen. Every week she bought some tins for her store cupboard and now she spent some time arranging them. There was a good deal of classifying and sorting to be done here; the tins could be arranged according to size or by types of food — meat, fish, fruit, vegetables, soup or miscellaneous. This last category included such unclassifiable items as tomato puree, stuffed vine leaves (this was an impulse buy) and tapioca pudding. There was work to be done here and Marcia enjoyed doing it.

Then, as the day was fine, she went into the garden and picked her way over the long uncut grass to the shed where she kept milk bottles. These needed to be checked from time to time and occasionally she even went as far as dusting them. Sometimes she would put out one for the milkman but she mustn't let the hoard get too low because if there was a national emergency of the kind that seemed so frequent nowadays or even another war, there could well be a shortage of milk bottles and we might find ourselves back in the situation of 'No bottle, no milk', as in the last war. As she moved among the bottles Marcia was irritated to discover one of an alien brand among the United Dairy bottles — 'County Dairies', it said. Wherever had that come from? She didn't remember noticing it before and of course the milkman wouldn't take it back — they only collected their own bottles. She stood with it in her hand, frowning at the effort of trying to remember where it could possibly have come from. Then it dawned on her. Letty had given her some milk one day at the office. She had been staying with that friend of hers in the country and had brought back a pint of milk, had drunk some of it for her lunch, then given the rest to Marcia. So that was it. Marcia felt suddenly annoyed with Letty for having foisted this alien bottle on her. She must be made to take it back.

Seeing her coming out of the shed with a milk bottle in her hand, Nigel, the young man next door, told himself that here was a chance to show neighbourly friendliness, as his wife Priscilla was always urging him to.
.

Would you like me to cut your grass, Miss Ivory?' he asked, going to the fence. 'I've got the mower out' Though really, seeing its length, a scythe would be more appropriate.

'No, thank you,' said Marcia politely, 'I prefer the grass as it is,' and went into the house. She was still feeling annoyed with Letty about the milk bottle. There was certainly no question of her offering Letty a room in her house now; that was not at all the sort of person one wanted under the same roof.

That evening Letty crouched in her room, listening. It wasn't even a rowdy party, these bursts of hymn-singing and joyful shouts, for Mr Olatunde, her new landlord, was a priest of a religious sect. 'Aladura,' Miss Embrey had murmured, but the name meant nothing, only the coming and going in the house and the noise. Now perhaps Letty really did feel like a drowning man, with the events of her past life unrolling before her, those particular events which had led her to this. How had it come about that she, an Englishwoman born in Malvern in 1914 of middle-class English parents, should find herself in this room in London surrounded by enthusiastic, shouting, hymn-singing Nigerians? It must surely be because she had not married. No man had taken her away and immured her in some comfortable suburb where hymn-singing was confined to Sundays and nobody was fired with enthusiasm. Why had this not happened? Because she had thought that love was a necessary ingredient for marriage? Now, having looked around her for forty years, she was not so sure. All those years wasted, looking for love! The thought of it was enough to bring about silence in the house and during the lull she plucked up the courage to go downstairs and tap — too timidly, she felt — at Mr Olatunde's door.

'I wonder if you could make a little less noise?' she asked. 'Some of us find it rather disturbing.'

'Christianity
is
disturbing,' said Mr Olatunde.

It was difficult to know how to answer this. Indeed Letty found it impossible so Mr Olatunde continued, smiling, 'You are a Christian lady?'

Letty hesitated. Her first instinct had been to say 'yes', for of course one was a Christian lady, even if one would not have put it quite like that. How was she to explain to this vital, ebullient black man her own blend of Christianity — a grey, formal, respectable thing of measured observances and mild general undemanding kindness to all? 'I'm sorry,' she said, drawing back, 'I didn't mean...' What had she meant? Confronted by these smiling people she felt she could hardly repeat her complaint about the noise.

A handsome woman in a long brightly coloured dress and head tie stepped forward. 'We are having supper now,' she said. 'You will join us?'

Letty was reminded of Norman as a rich spicy smell was wafted towards her. She thanked the woman politely, saying that she had already eaten.

'I'm afraid you would not like our Nigerian cooking,' said Mr Olatunde, with a touch of complacency.

'No, perhaps not.' Letty withdrew, embarrassed by the crowd of smiling faces that seemed to be pressing in on her. We are not the same, she thought hopelessly. She wondered what Edwin and Norman and Marcia would have done in the circumstances, but came to no conclusions. Other people's reactions were unpredictable and while she could imagine Edwin entering into the religious aspect of the evening and even taking part in the service, it might well be that Norman and Marcia, usually so set in their isolation, would in some surprising way have been drawn into the friendly group. Only Letty remained outside.

Eight

T
HERE
HAD
ALREADY
been a good deal of talk in the office about Letty's situation and what she ought to do about it, and as time went on the question became more urgent, especially when Marya found a living-in job as housekeeper to a family in Hampstead, and Miss Spurgeon made arrangements to go into an old people's home.