The Happy Prisoner (35 page)

“You poor idiot,” laughed Oliver. “People in my situation don't get sore about other people doing things they can't do. They just send them off with their blessing and feel pleased they haven't got to go through the wear and tear themselves.”

“You're a funny fellow,” said Toby. “I say, how about starting our needle chess contests again? I could come over whenever I'm at home.”

“I'd love it.”

“Could I come on Sunday? I'll be staying down over the week-end.”

“Any time you like,” said Oliver and was glad. He had always liked Toby, and he often thought he could do with a little more male company.

“Hrrm-hm!” Stanford Black, entertaining the company by pretending to be a hired M.C., banged on the table with a poker. “Me lords, ladies and
gen
-tlemen! Pray silence for Major John Sandbag—I
beg
your pardon—Sandys!” Laughter.

“Who
is
that man?” asked Lady Salter. A tasselled stole of tired little martens' tails lay round her neck, and she smelled faintly of mothballs.

“Stanford Black. Friend of Heather's—friend of ours, that is. He's been stationed at Ockney for the last two years. Had to be taken off flying because he had a nervous breakdown or something—too much night fighting.”

“Ah,” said Lady Salter dreamily, “one of the First of the Few. Nice-looking boy.” She had two daughters at home. “Have I met his wife? Oh—isn't he? … What did you say his name was?”

“Black. His family are the Sidney Blacks—you know, the hotel people. Useful sort of man to know. He got us this champagne.”

“Very useful,” mused Lady Salter.

John had by this time been ferreted out from a corner and dragged into the middle of the room. He knew he had got to make a speech, and unnecessary cries of “Spee-eech!” only hampered his starting.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he began, squaring his shoulders, clenching his fists, and looking like Max Baer about to attack, “it is my pleasant duty to propose the health of the bride and bridegroom.” People with empty glasses looked worriedly round in the hope of finding someone to fill them up. “I believe it is customary to say a few words at this point.” Heather was standing near Stanford, looking bored. “I can't say I've known the bridegroom very long,” went on John creakingly, “but it has been my great pleasure to know the bride for—let's see—it must be nearly six years. Now, you all know Violet—”

“Gosh,” muttered Violet, who had been standing by him with a vacuous smile plastered over her face, “I didn't know he was going to gas about me.” She sagged slightly at the knees to make herself less conspicuous and looked about for escape, but the crowd pressed round her and said: “Good old Vi!”

“We all know Violet,” persevered John, who had sweated over his speech during many hours of concentrated thought while he lay in bed with flu, “and what's more, we all know her as one of the most genuine, kind-hearted, likeable people going.” Violet looked down and shuffled her feet; Fred's nose was aflame with pride. “And I do feel,” said John, “that I must take this opportunity of paying tribute to the untiring way in which she has worked for the war effort all these years.”

“Hear, hear,” said a few people gruffly.

“Fred will tell you”—John looked down at the bridegroom, who cocked his head on one side and tried to look informative—“and I'm sure you will know that there's nothing more exhausting than working on the land. Vi's done a man's work, and more; in fact, Fred will probably tell you that he couldn't have kept the
farm going without her through these difficult years.” More gruff acclaim. “But then he's prejudiced,” said John, making his joke and getting his indulgent laughter. “How fitting it is, then, that these two, who have worked together so successfully, are now teaming up to make it a life partnership.”

Muffet, standing on a chair to see better, was deeply moved. Lady Salter murmured to Oliver: “Perhaps it isn't such an unfortunate match after all.”

“And I'm sure you'll agree,” went on John, tense in his efforts not to forget what he wanted to say, “that the Land Army's loss has been Fred's gain.”

“But I wasn't in the Land Army, you ass,” said Violet, looking up indignantly and getting the ready laugh that wedding guests are always so eager to discharge.

“As for Fred, I haven't known him very long, but it's been long enough to see what a jolly fine chap he is, not to mention one of the best farmers in the district.” Fred nearly succumbed under the back-slapping that fell on him from his friends, who were bunched behind him like the chorus in
The Country Girl
.

John was beginning to look rather careworn. “Well,” he said, taking a deep breath and coming thankfully to the end of his speech. “I don't think there's anything more to say except that I'm sure we wish them all the good luck and happiness in the world. They certainly deserve it. So, ladies and gentlemen, may I ask you to raise your glasses”—he raised his champagne glass, which looked fragile in his huge fist—“and drink to the health and happiness of the bride and bridegroom. Vi and Fred!”

“Vi and Fred!” echoed people self-consciously and sipped at their glasses like birds. Oliver suddenly heard himself call out in a squeaky voice: “Three cheers for Vi and Fred! Hip, hip—”

“Hooray!” yelled everyone, and one of Violet's dogs, which was wandering about with a blue bow round its neck, jumped, and scurried under a table. Some of the women looked sentimentally at Oliver and thought: How sad. His mother gave him a long-range beam from the other side of the room and raised her glass to him. Several people struck up: “For they are jolly good fellows” in different keys and Oliver saw the Cowlins, standing in the doorway with the party from the kitchen, singing lustily, Cowlin without a tooth in his head, Mrs. Cowlin nodding her head madly in a purple velour hat. Mrs. Ogilvie made quite a performance of it, thrusting out her chest as if she had to fill the Albert Hall; Lady Salter moved her lips politely, as she did in church; Muffet carolled clear and true above the other voices; Francis, in an olive green suit and floral cravat,
opened and shut his sea anemone lips in the least possible concession to so banal a performance.

Violet and Fred were standing hand in hand like babes in the wood, looking rather sweet. Fred kept moistening his lips and swallowing. He knew what he had to do.

Stanford Black banged the table again. “Ladies and gentlemen, “he said, copying a joke which he had heard a real M.C. make at a London wedding, “the bridegroom would
like
to reply!” More laughter and back-slapping. Fred was nearly pushed head first into the cake. Violet stepped back and made a face at him. “Get on with it,” she urged.

Blinking with his whole face, Fred opened his mouth very wide, then almost closed it and let a few words trickle through. “L-l-ladies and gentlemen,” he faltered. One or two people cupped their hands behind their ears, and Mrs. Norris retuned her ear-box. “On behalf of my wife”—he had been told that he must get that in—“on behalf of my wife and I, a-tha—a-tha—a-thank you very much.” It came out in a triumphant rush, and as they applauded him he looked modestly down his nose. Calls for a speech from Violet brought forth a throaty “Thanks awf'ly”, and then Ken was seen to be swallowing his Adam's apple, preparatory to speaking up.

He spoke quickly and well. “Ladies and gentlemen, it's customary, I believe, on these occasions for the best man to propose the health of the bridesmaids. As there aren't any, my friends Fred and Vi preferring to get hitched up in an informal kind of way, I'd like to propose a toast which I know you will drink with the greatest enthusiasm—the founder of this really magnificent feast: our hostess—Mrs. North!”

She was pushed forward, shaking her head and protesting. “Well, say—well, say, that's lovely of you, and I only want to say what a beautiful thing it is to me to see you all here in my house at my dear Violet's wedding. And I hope you won't think me a sentimental old fool if I ask you to turn around and drink the health of someone very dear to us all, someone—
mm-hm,
— who hasn't been quite as lucky as the rest of us.” She raised her glass. Oliver was terrified that she was going to burst into tears. “My son, Oliver!”

He wished he might go under the bedclothes. Everyone was toasting him with great warmth and he did not like being the spring that touched off their fountains of sentiment. “Thanks a lot,” he said. “How about cutting that cake, Vi?”

“You bet,” she said, and picking up the carving knife, plunged it into the cake and bore down on it with token assistance from
Fred at the extreme end of the handle. She wanted to slice it all up, but her mother would not let her. “We must keep it neat, dear. Let Elizabeth take it out to the kitchen and cut it up onto plates. Where
is
she?” Elizabeth stepped quietly forward from the background and took the cake away, reappearing a few minutes later with plates of neat slices, which she offered round. Oliver heard people asking who she was and being told: “That's Oliver's nurse,” and he could see that they were stimulated by champagne into thinking it romantic that he should have a pretty nurse. He saw her offer some to Mary Brewer, who was standing in a corner in a yellow dress and a fawn hat. This wedding was the first time they had met, and when he introduced them, Oliver had watched with glee their shrewd summing-up of each other. Now that he was better, Mary no longer came when Elizabeth was away. She was obviously asking after the patient, because Elizabeth raised her eyebrows and glanced across at him, before she said something in a clipped voice. Mary had taken the smallest piece of cake. “Won't you have another bit,” Elizabeth asked,” to put under your pillow?” Involuntarily, Mary glanced across at Oliver and he looked hastily away and met the concentrated gaze of Mrs. Ogilvie coming through the crowd with the determination of the
Penelope
ploughing her way through the mines to Malta.

“My dear Oliver,” she said in an urgent, breathy whisper, “I must tell you the most extraordinary thing. I've just been upstairs to the Fairies”—it was a form of bravado with her to announce her visits there—” and you know that table in the top corridor? Well, perhaps you don't; it's such ages since you went upstairs, poor darling. Well, anyway, there's a table there where your mother keeps odd little decorative bits and pieces—the woman's touch, you know, that she's so good at.” Oliver waited with a sinking heart for her to come to the point. “Well, today, it's positively littered with the most extraordinary collection, just like a jumble sale. I wouldn't perhaps have noticed anything, only, as I was passing, I saw among all the face cream and gloves and pincushions and bits of jewellery—this.” She held up dramatically a scarf of stiff and shiny green silk, which Oliver had last seen her discarding in his room. “I can't think how it got there, because I haven't been upstairs till just now.” She laughed frankly. “My family always tells me I must be an angel.”

“Oh well,” Oliver said easily. “I expect one of the maids has put everything there that she found lying about, not knowing who they belonged to.”

“Oh, have you got a maid now? Mrs. Cowlin? She doesn't go upstairs, does she? She's been in the kitchen all the time today; I've seen her downing beer in there when I've been through to the scullery to wash glasses for your mother. Or do you mean Elizabeth? But then, my dear boy, why a sponge? Don't think me curious, but it did strike me as odd when this house is usually so neat. I mean, why one bedroom slipper?”

Curse Miss Smutts and her fiendish tactlessness. He believed she enjoyed playing fence to Lady Sandys' pilfering. It was all very well to retrieve the goods, but why wasn't she, today of all days, doing her job and looking after her employer instead of letting her accumulate so much in such a short time? He would give the old fool a piece of his mind. As Mrs. Ogilvie, firmly clutching her crocodile pochette, moved away to probe further into this intriguing mystery, Oliver said to Heather, who was standing near with Stanford: “Seen Smutty anywhere? I want a word with her.”

Heather giggled. “Probably passed out somewhere. She's been drinking like a fish.” Heather herself had not been doing too badly, or else the concentrated attentions which Stanford was paying her had elated her. She was pink and rather unstable, her fringe flopping as she threw her head about in the way she had when she was talking excitedly.

“Wasn't it a scream, the speeches?” she said. “Stanny and I nearly burst ourselves trying not to laugh at Fred, didn't we? Darling Ollie.” She swooped round on him in a gush of affection. “Are you enjoying yourself? I do hope you are. Can I get you anything—or a nice, pretty girl to talk to? I don't think there are any. Stanford wants us to go on to a party afterwards. I do wish you could come. Don't you wish he could come, Stanny?”

“Rather,” said Stanford. “Wizard party at the Bartons'. They said bring along anyone I liked; they always have lashings of booze.”

“Is John going?” asked O'liver, feeling austere.

Heather frowned.

“Oh, we wanted him to, of course, but the old stooge says he feels too tired. He's getting quite an old woman about his health; God knows how long he'll go on trading on this flu.”

“What about Elizabeth?” Oliver asked. “I'll be all right if you want to take her.”

Heather looked at Stanford. “I don't see how she can really, because of the children. She said she'd put them to bed for me
if I wanted to go out. She's upstairs now, as a matter of fact, starting Susan, because she was getting so cross.”

“Oh, I see,” Oliver said.

People were drifting about restlessly now, feeling the effects of champagne in the middle of the afternoon, thinking it was time to go. But they could not go before Violet, and Violet would not go. She was still enjoying herself too much. She and Fred were going to drive to a hotel at Wells and on the next day to Exmoor, the horses having been already sent by train.