Late, Late in the Evening

headed man-servant appeared.

'Oh, Barker, see that they put the car away, will you? I shan't be needing it again today,' said the young man. 'Hullo,' he said to us, 'are you the merchants who kicked off the cartshed roof and tried to drown yourselves in the sheepwash? Good! Come on in.' He led us past the stately butler and we found ourselves in what appeared to me to be a vast, baronial hall. It had a splendid staircase leading up from it and on the wall of the staircase were portraits. It was awe-inspiring and filled me with renewed apprehension.

The stately butler collected the young man's light overcoat and driving gloves and Kenneth's cap. I stood aside and furtively dusted the toes of my shoes against my stockings.

'All right, Barker, we'll show ourselves up,' said the young man. 'How is my mother?'

'You will find the mistress in her usual good health, sir.'

'The people from Paris arrived yet?'

'With Miss Amabel, yes, sir.'

'Good. Well, now, I'm Nigel Kempson. Who are you two?' he said to us. 'I know you're Lionel's friends, but not your names.'

'Margaret and Kenneth Clifton,' I said. We mounted the splendid staircase and at the end of a short landing the young man flung open double doors painted in white and gold and having what I thought at the time were real gold handles, and said,

'What ho, everybody! Hullo, Lionel! I've brought along your companions in crime.'

It was an enormous room which dwarfed the people in it. I was too confused and shy at the moment to tell how many there were, but I know now that there were not more than seven or eight. Old Mrs Kempson was there, seated near an enormous Tudor fireplace in which a very small log fire was burning, and grouped around the room were a number of people of both sexes and of different ages among whom were Lionel's parents (we were told) and his sister. There were other introductions. Nobody shook hands, as we were accustomed to do at home when we met new people, but they nodded kindly and some of them smiled.

The point which immediately struck me was that Aunt Lally had been right about clothes. Lionel was wearing a smart black jacket and beautifully-creased light-grey trousers which made Kenneth's Sunday outfit look low-class and shoddy. He had come forward from his seat on a big leather pouffe as soon as we entered the room. He looked elegant and at ease and seemed like a stranger.

'Hullo,' he said. 'Glad you could come. Grandmamma, this is Margaret and this is Kenneth.'

Mrs Kempson, whom we had sometimes seen in the village, smiled rather frostily at us after Lionel had made the other introductions (with a sang froid which I envied him) and said, graciously grande dame:

'I hear you have been very kind to Lionel.' She then told us to sit on a sofa. A bit later on she said,

'Well, Lionel, you may run along now. You must bring your little friends back here when they are ready to go home at six and they will say goodbye to me.'

So it was schoolroom tea after all, or, rather, it was tea in the housekeeper's room. It was a very good tea, too. There was bloater paste as well as jam, chocolate biscuits and little buns as well as a big plum cake. The housekeeper was an intimidating, unsmiling, elderly little woman, but, having poured out tea and re-filled the pot, she left us to ourselves.

During the meal there was almost no conversation. After a preliminary period during which Kenneth and I ate in our most genteel way, stiffness and formality were abandoned and, without wasting time in talking, we stuffed ourselves with the riches of the loaded table. The housekeeper looked in once or twice, but she said nothing and went away again immediately.

'Well, that's that, then,' said Lionel when, regretfully, we had to admit that we could not manage to eat any more. 'There isn't time to do much, so would you rather come outside or go up and see my playroom?'

'What would we do outside?' asked my brother.

'Nothing, really. There's never anything to do here. We could skate stones on the pond, if you like.'

We opted for the playroom, hoping that he had some good toys and also mindful (at least, I was) that we were wearing our best clothes and that these and a pond might not harmonise. The playroom was at the very top of the house; in fact, it was one of the attics. Lionel's bedroom was next door and opened out of it.

He had not much in the way of toys, but there was a tin roundabout which worked when you wound it up, although the musical-box on it was broken. We played with this and with a few other things such as a humming-top and a small game of skittles. The roundabout, however, reminded me of St Swithin's Fair. I asked Lionel whether he would be going to it.

'When is it?'

'Saturday.'

'Then I won't be able to. It's my sister's birthday party. I don't suppose they'd let me go, anyway.'

'We shan't be going, either,' said Kenneth. 'We go home on Saturday afternoon because our London school starts on Monday, worse luck.'

We had told lies to Our Sarah and the other children about the amount of money we would spend at the fair because we knew the truth would never come out. Of course we had nothing to spend, or so we thought.

'You're going home?' said Lionel. 'Oh, you can't do that! Who shall I have to play with? I'm stuck here for another three weeks.'

'There's your sister's birthday party,' said Kenneth.

'That's no good to me. She's inviting a lot of idiotic girls she used to be at school with, and their brothers, and Nigel's friends. It will be nothing but dancing and charades and all that sort of rot. In fact, I believe there's even some talk of fancy dress.'