At any rate I never remember being ill at Christmas. Nan Watts was just the same as I was; she had a splendid stomach. In fact, really, when I remember those days, everyone seemed to have a pretty good stomach. I suppose people had gastric and duodenal ulcers and had to be careful, but I cannot remember anybody living on a diet of fish and milk. A coarse and gluttonous age? Yes, but one of great zest and enjoyment. Considering the amount that I ate in my youth (for I was always hungry) I cannot imagine how I managed to remain so thin—a scrawny chicken indeed.
After the pleasurable inertia of Christmas afternoon—pleasurable, that is, for the elders: the younger ones read books, looked at their presents, ate more chocolates, and so on—there was a terrific tea, with a great iced Christmas cake as well as everything else, and finally a supper of cold turkey and hot mince pies. About nine o’clock there was the Christmas Tree, with more presents hanging on it. A splendid day, and one to be remembered till next year, when Christmas came again.
Three Blind Mice
It was very cold. The sky was dark and heavy with unshed snow.
A man in a dark overcoat, with his muffler pulled up round his face, and his hat pulled down over his eyes, came along Culver Street and went up the steps of number 74. He put his finger on the bell and heard it shrilling in the basement below.
Mrs Casey, her hands busy in the sink, said bitterly, ‘Drat that bell. Never any peace, there isn’t.’
Wheezing a little, she toiled up the basement stairs and opened the door.
The man standing silhouetted against the lowering sky outside asked in a whisper, ‘Mrs Lyon?’
‘Second floor,’ said Mrs Casey. ‘You can go on up. Does she expect you?’ The man slowly shook his head. ‘Oh, well, go on up and knock.’
She watched him as he went up the shabbily carpeted stairs. Afterwards she said he ‘gave her a funny feeling.’ But actually all she thought was that he must have a pretty bad cold only to be able to whisper like that—and no wonder with the weather what it was.
When the man got round the bend of the staircase he began to whistle softly. The tune he whistled was ‘Three Blind Mice.’
Molly Davis stepped back into the road and looked up at the newly painted board by the gate.
MONKSWELL MANOR
GUEST HOUSE
She nodded approval. It looked, it really did look, quite professional. Or, perhaps, one might say almost professional. The T of Guest House staggered uphill a little, and the end of Manor was slightly crowded, but on the whole Giles had made a wonderful job of it. Giles was really very clever. There were so many things that he could do. She was always making fresh discoveries about this husband of hers. He said so little about himself that it was only by degrees that she was finding out what a lot of varied talents he had. An ex-naval man was always a ‘handy man,’ so people said.
Well, Giles would have need of all his talents in their new venture. Nobody could be more raw to the business of running a guest house than she and Giles. But it would be great fun. And it did solve the housing problem.
It had been Molly’s idea. When Aunt Katherine died, and the lawyers wrote to her and informed her that her aunt had left her Monkswell Manor, the natural reaction of the young couple had been to sell it. Giles had asked, ‘What is it like?’ And Molly had replied, ‘Oh, a big, rambling old house, full of stuffy, old-fashioned Victorian furniture. Rather a nice garden, but terribly overgrown since the war, because there’s been only one old gardener left.’
So they had decided to put the house on the market, and keep just enough furniture to furnish a small cottage or flat for themselves.
But two difficulties arose at once. First, there weren’t any small cottages or flats to be found, and secondly, all the furniture was enormous.
‘Well,’ said Molly, ‘we’ll just have to sell it all. I suppose it will sell?’
The solicitor assured them that nowadays anything would sell.
‘Very probably,’ he said, ‘someone will buy it for a hotel or guesthouse in which case they might like to buy it with the furniture complete. Fortunately the house is in very good repair. The late Miss Emory had extensive repairs and modernizations done just before the war, and there has been very little deterioration. Oh, yes, it’s in good shape.’
And it was then that Molly had had her idea.
‘Giles,’ she said, ‘why shouldn’t we run it as a guesthouse ourselves?’
At first her husband had scoffed at the idea, but Molly had persisted.
‘We needn’t take very many people—not at first. It’s an easy house to run—it’s got hot and cold water in the bedrooms and central heating and a gas cooker. And we can have hens and ducks and our own eggs, and vegetables.’
‘Who’d do all the work—isn’t it very hard to get servants?’
‘Oh, we’d have to do the work. But wherever we lived we’d have to do that. A few extra people wouldn’t really mean much more to do. We’d probably get a woman to come in after a bit when we got properly started. If we had only five people, each paying seven guineas a week—’ Molly departed into the realms of somewhat optimistic mental arithmetic.
‘And think, Giles,’ she ended, ‘it would be our own house. With our own things. As it is, it seems to me it will be years before we can ever find anywhere to live.’
That, Giles admitted, was true. They had had so little time together since their
