Wigs on the Green (12 page)

‘Naturally there will be no question of doing that. I am going to ring up Mr Wilkins now this minute and tell him you have made a mistake.’

‘Anne-Marie, you can do that if you like, but I warn you that I shan’t turn up at your blasted party unless Wilkins does,’ said Major Lace, setting his jaw.

‘Nonsense, Hubert, of course you’ll have to come. It would look very odd if you didn’t, and besides, who’s to mix the cocktails?’

‘I don’t give a damn who mixes the cocktails. Leader can mix them.’

‘You know he can’t; he’s teetotal.’

‘He would be. Anyway if I’m to come Wilkins must come, you can take it or leave it old girl.’ So saying, Major Lace stumped off to his cow-byres.

Mrs Lace spent much of the morning in tears of rage. During luncheon she uttered no word, a fact which Major Lace apparently never noticed, as he went on as usual, chatting about John’s disease, and the tubercular content of a pint of milk. He did not mention Mr Wilkins or the party, and the moment he had swallowed his food he went off again. Arrangements for the party occupied Anne-Marie’s afternoon, but gave her little satisfaction. Even the arrival of Mr Leader, who came, as he had promised that he would, to decorate her drawing-room with whitewashed brambles and cellophane, failed to improve her temper.

While she was changing her dress, however, her spirits began to rise, and by the time that the first guests had appeared she became positively gay once more. She enjoyed entertaining more than anything else on earth, and was, considering her inexperience, a good enough hostess, unflagging in her zeal to please.

Neighbour after neighbour now arrived, husbands, wives, daughters, and an occasional son home on leave or down from Oxford. They were all jolly friendly, dull people, and were suitably startled by Anne-Marie’s silver
lamé
cocktail-trousers and heavy make-up. The young men from Rackenbridge struck, she considered, exactly the right note of Bohemian négligé in their shrimp trousers and
‘Aertex’ shirts open at the neck. The scene, in fact, was now set for the entry of Mrs Lace’s new friends. Anxiously she began to keep one eye on the drive, and for a whole hour she played Pagliacci, chatting and laughing with a breaking heart. For the new friends did not appear.

When finally they did turn up, fearfully late, and accompanied by a stockingless Eugenia, they all seemed to be in the last stages of exhaustion. ‘We are quite worn out, you see,’ Jasper explained politely, ‘by Eugenia’s party. It was an absolute riot from beginning to end. We think she is a genius Eugenia, Eugenius, E.U.G.E.N.I.A. Eugenia.’

‘It was too lovely,’ said Lady Marjorie, who appeared far less languid than usual. She had colour in her cheeks and her eyes shone. ‘But why didn’t you come, Mrs Lace; you can’t imagine what a lovely party it was.’

‘We sang Jackshirt hymns for hours outside the head-quarters,’ said Poppy. ‘“Onward Union Jackshirts” – D’you know that one; shall we teach it you, another time perhaps? Then we went for a wonderful march with a band playing and we each carried a Union Jack. Marge and I have both joined up. The Comrades were heaven, so beautiful-looking.’

They all fell into chairs and fanned themselves. Poppy and Marjorie looked anything but smart London ladies, calculated to impress local housewives. Eugenia, her eye suddenly lighting upon Mr Leader pointed him out to Poppy, saying in a stage whisper, ‘He’s a well-known Pacifist. Shall we give him Union Jackshirt justice?’

‘Not now,’ Poppy whispered back, ‘we’re all much too tired.’

A sort of blight now began to fall on Mrs Lace’s party. It was dreadful for her because nobody was behaving in the way she had planned they should. Most of the neighbours had gone home to their early dinners and those that remained formed little knots in the garden, talking to each other about sport or to Major Lace about the iniquities of the Milk Marketing Board. The Rackenbridge young men hung round the bar eating and drinking all they
could lay their hands on, while her new friends were being in no way wonderful, but merely lay about the place in attitudes of extreme debility.

‘We are so tired,’ they reiterated apologetically, ‘you should have seen what a distance we marched, it was terrible. In this heat too, whew!’

Poppy, who had a conscience about these things, did whisper in Jasper’s ear that she thought they should mingle a bit more. Jasper replied, ‘Mingle then,’ but nothing happened.

Mrs Lace brought up Mr Leader and introduced him all round, saying, ‘It was Leslie who did these wonderful decorations for me. He is a Surréaliste you know.’

Poppy said, politely, ‘Oh! how interesting. Aren’t you the people who like intestines and pulling out babies’ eyes?’

Jasper said that he had once written a play, the whole action of which took place inside Jean Cocteau’s stomach. ‘Unfortunately I sold the film rights,’ he added, ‘otherwise you could have had them. The film was put on in Paris and many people had to leave the Jockey Club and stop being Roman Catholics because of it. I was pleased.’

Eugenia looked gloomily at Mr Leader, and said in a menacing voice, ‘You should see the inside of the new Social Unionist head-quarters.’

‘It’s even more exciting than the inside of Jean Cocteau’s stomach,’ added Jasper.

After these sallies conversation died, and poor Mr Leader presently wandered away. Noel now lay back and put a newspaper over his face – nobody could have supposed, to see him, that he was madly in love with his hostess, nor were her guests at all likely to go home with the impression that between these two people was undying romance. Mrs Lace looked at him in despair.

Worse things, however, were to befall her. Presently the hated Mr Wilkins, looking even less
soigné
than usual, and covered with white dust, was shepherded into the room by Major Lace, who rubbed his hands together saying, ‘Here’s dear old George at last – broke down twice on the way! Still, better late than never, eh!
George? I thought that was your old bag of nails heard rattling up the drive. Cocktail or whisky and soda, eh?’

‘I absolutely love that man’s appearance,’ Lady Marjorie whispered to Poppy.

‘He certainly has a very whimsical face,’ Poppy agreed.

At this juncture Mrs Lace was called away from the room to speak on the telephone. One of the neighbours had left a dust-coat behind and would call for it the following day. ‘We loved your party,’ she added. ‘It was too bad we had to leave so early.’ Mrs Lace agreed that it was too bad, promised to keep the dust-coat quite safely, and returned to the drawing-room, where an extremely painful sight met her eyes.

Mr Wilkins was seated on a sofa between Mrs St Julien and Lady Marjorie who were both doubled up with laughter. Mr Aspect, and the nameless but exalted Noel, crouching on the floor beside them, also appeared to be highly amused, whilst Major Lace stood over the whole group with the expression of a conjurer who has just produced from his sleeve some enchanting toy.

‘And have you heard about the man who went into W. H. Smith?’ Mr Wilkins was saying.

‘No,’ they cried, in chorus.

‘He said to the girl behind the counter, “Do you keep stationery?” And she said, “No, I always wriggle.”’

Roars of laughter greeted this story.

‘And do you know about the man who was had up by the police?’

‘No.’

‘They said, “Anything you say will be held against you.” He said,
“Anything
I say will be held against me?” and they said, “Yes,” and he said, “Right oh, then, Greta Garbo.”’

As Mrs Lace gazed with disgust upon this scene, she was approached by Mr Leader, who, looking as if he had a bad smell under his nose, came up to say goodbye.

‘I will walk down the garden with you,’ she said, glad of any excuse to take her away from hateful Mr Wilkins and his success.

‘Dear, lovely Anne-Marie,’ said Mr Leader, putting his hand on
her arm, ‘do explain your new friends to me – what is the point of them? You always used to tell me how much you dislike that sort of person, rich, smart, idle and stupid,’ he spoke reproachfully.

‘You don’t quite understand,’ said poor Mrs Lace. ‘They are delightful really, only today they seem different. If you talked to them alone you wouldn’t think them at all stupid.’

‘My dear, they must be stupid if they have joined the Social Unionist party.’

‘Oh! I think that’s all a joke.’

‘Social Unionism is no joke. It is a menace to the life’s work of those who, like myself, love peace and wish all men equal. Surely, Anne-Marie, you cannot in two short weeks have forgotten all our wonderful ideals?’

‘Oh! no,’ said Anne-Marie, ‘it’s not that. But it is always interesting to meet new people, don’t you think so, to try and get a view of life from their angle? And Noel Foster is, in many ways, very exceptional. The others are nice, but he is something different from what I have ever known. I can’t explain why, you must meet him again, more quietly and see for yourself.’

‘No thank you,’ said Mr Leader, ‘I have seen enough of him this afternoon.’

‘I wondered,’ Mrs Lace went on, ‘whether all of you at Rackenbridge would help us with the pageant? We want various groups of people to undertake the different episodes, nothing is quite settled yet though.’

Mr Leader said he would think it over. ‘I must say goodbye now, you wonderful creature. Don’t forget that you are the greatest inspiration any man could have, and never waste your friendship on somebody who may be unworthy of such a gift.’

Mrs Lace could have kicked him for not making this pretty compliment in the hearing of Noel. She felt it to be utterly wasted among the dank laurels at the bottom of the garden.

When she got back to the house she found that all her guests had departed, with the exception of Mr Wilkins and his still admiring claque.

‘Here’s Anne-Marie,’ said Noel, affectionately. ‘Come over here and talk to us for a bit. You’ve been a hostess for long enough.’

‘Oh! yes,’ cried Poppy, making room for her on the sofa. ‘We want you, we want to tell you all the things we’ve been fixing up for the pageant.’

‘Ah! the pageant,’ Mrs Lace felt happier. What mattered it that her cocktail-party had not been all she had hoped when she still had the pageant glowing on her horizon? She reminded herself that she and Noel were to play the parts of Queen Charlotte and George the Third. Together they would drive through cheering crowds, bowing to right and to left of them, a cynosure for all eyes, in the beautiful and historic coach that Lady Chalford was lending on that occasion.

This picture was constantly in Anne-Marie’s mind; she thought about it nearly the whole time. How sweet and pretty she would look in her charming head-dress, how handsome the appearance of Noel in wig and uniform; how evident to all observers their great love for each other. In after days those who had seen them would be saying, ‘What a pity we didn’t know then who he really was. I suppose we might have guessed from the grace and ease with which he acknowledged the cheers. Of course, they were deeply in love, nobody could have failed to realize that. How romantic it all is!’

Perhaps their photograph would appear in the newspapers, a photograph in which Noel would be gazing at her, a whole wealth of love in his eyes. There was no end to the intoxicating vista of possibilities which stretched out before Anne-Marie when she began to think about the pageant.

What was Poppy saying now? ‘Yes, it was Marge’s idea. She is clever to have thought of it, and it’s all quite settled. Mr Wilkins is going to be George the Third! He has promised he will at last, but we had to go down on our hands and knees to persuade him, didn’t we, Mr Wilkins? And that will make the pageant a most wonderful success because no two people have ever looked so much alike as Mr Wilkins and George the Third; had you noticed
it? Now you know we shall have to be getting back to Chalford because it’s fearfully late and our dinner will be ready. We have loved the party, specially meeting Mr Wilkins. Thank you so much for it, and for introducing us to Mr Wilkins, it was heavenly of you. Goodbye Mr Wilkins, see you tomorrow then, at about one.’

Major Lace could not understand why his wife cried herself to sleep that night. He supposed that she must be in the family way again.

Next day at the usual hour Noel pushed his way, hooting from time to time, through the undergrowth which surrounded his trysting-place. As he heard no answering cry, he presumed that Anne-Marie had been unable to come. He found her lying, however, a little crumpled heap of despondency, on the steps of the temple, and very soon she was sobbing her heart out on Noel’s shoulder.

‘Darling, I really can’t see that it matters as much as all that,’ he said, when at last he had realized the reason for all this misery. ‘Of course it would have been fun to do it together, and it is sweet of you to mind, but you know, Lady Marjorie is quite right, Mr Wilkins is the living double of George the Third. Rather clever of her to notice I thought.’

‘Oh! you don’t understand,’ sobbed Mrs Lace. ‘I’m not so stupid as to make all this fuss over an old pageant, although I had been looking forward to acting with you quite particularly.’

‘Then what is it, my darling?’ said Noel, who was getting rather bored with this scene.

‘I’m so dreadfully, dreadfully unhappy.’

‘Darling, why?’

‘You’re so unkind to me. I feel I can’t bear it any longer.’

‘Unkind?’

‘All the secrecy.’

‘What secrecy?’

Mrs Lace had now, more or less, recovered her composure. She knew that she looked pretty when she cried, so long as the crying only lasted a little while. Therefore, at the psychological moment she usually stopped. She did so now, and proceeded to comb her hair and powder her nose, peeping from beneath dewy
eyelashes at Noel from time to time. There was an expression on his face which she interpreted as a warning not to go too far. In actual fact he was merely reminding himself that all women like an occasional good cry; it was a tax which lovers had to pay. He hoped that she would cut it short, meanwhile steeling himself to endurance.

‘You see, darling,’ she went on presently, ‘it is rather cruel, the way you never tell me anything about yourself.’