‘Darling – darling –!’
‘Utterly bloody. But if Montdore asks us I think we should go.’
As for Aunt Sadie, she was always so vague, so much in the clouds, that it was never easy to know what she really thought of people, but I believe that though she rather enjoyed the company of Lady Montdore in small doses, she did not share my uncle’s feelings about Lord Montdore, for when she spoke of him there was always a note of disparagement in her voice.
‘Something silly about his look,’ she used to say, though never in front of Uncle Matthew, for it would have hurt his feelings dreadfully.
‘So that’s Louisa and poor Linda accounted for,’ Lady Montdore went on. ‘Now you must be the next one, Fanny.’
‘Oh no,’ I said. ‘Nobody will ever marry me.’ And indeed I could not imagine anybody wanting to, I seemed to myself so much less fascinating than the other girls I knew, and I despised my looks, hating my round pink cheeks and rough curly black hair which never could be made to frame my face in silken cords, however much I wetted and brushed it, but would insist on growing the wrong way, upwards, like heather.
‘Nonsense. And don’t you go marrying just anybody, for love,’ she said. ‘Remember that love cannot last, it never never does, but if you marry all this it’s for your life. One day, don’t forget, you’ll be middle-aged and think what that must be like for a woman who can’t have, say, a pair of diamond earrings. A woman of my age needs diamonds near her face, to give a sparkle. Then at meal times, sitting with all the unimportant people for ever and ever. And no motor. Not a very nice prospect, you know. Of course,’ she added as an afterthought, ‘I was lucky, I had love as well as all this, but it doesn’t often happen, and when the moment comes for you to choose, just remember what I say. I suppose Fanny ought to go now and catch her train – and when you’ve seen her off, will you find Boy please and send him up here to me, Polly? I want to think over the dinner party for next week with him. Good-bye, then, Fanny – let’s see a lot of you now we’re back.’
On the way down we ran into Boy.
‘Mummy wants to see you,’ said Polly, gravely posing, her blue look upon him. He put his hand to her shoulder and massaged it with his thumb.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘about this dinner party, I suppose. Are you coming to it, old girl?’
‘Oh, I expect so,’ she said. ‘I’m out now, you know.’
‘I can’t say I look forward to it very much. Your mother’s ideas on placement get vaguer and vaguer. The table last night was totally mad, the duchesse is still in a temper about it! Sonia really shouldn’t have people at all if she doesn’t intend to treat them properly.’
A phrase I had often heard on the lips of my Aunt Emily, with reference to animals.
7
Back at home I was naturally unable to talk of anything but my visit. Davey was much amused and said he had never known me so chatty.
‘But my dear child,’ he said, ‘weren’t you petrified? Sauveterre and the Chaddesley Corbetts –! Far worse even than I had expected.’
‘Well yes, at first I thought I’d die. But nobody took any notice of me really except Mrs Chaddesley Corbett and Lady Montdore –’
‘Oh! And what notice did they take, may I ask?’
‘Well, Mrs Chaddesley Corbett said Mummy bolted first of all with Mr Chaddesley Corbett.’
‘So she did,’ said Davey, ‘that boring old Chad, I’d quite forgotten. But you don’t mean to say Veronica told you so? I wouldn’t have thought it possible, even of her.’
‘No, I heard her tell, in eggy-peggy.’
‘I see. Well then, what about Sonia?’
‘Oh, she was sweet to me.’
‘She was, was she? This is indeed sinister news.’
‘What is sinister news?’ said Aunt Emily, coming in with her dogs. ‘It’s simply glorious out, I can’t imagine why you two are stuffing in here on such a heavenly day.’
‘We’re gossiping about this party you so unwisely allowed Fanny to go to. And I was saying that if Sonia has really taken a fancy to our little one, which it seems she has, we must look out for trouble, that’s all.’
‘What trouble?’ I said.
‘Sonia’s terribly fond of juggling with people’s lives. I never shall forget when she made me go to her doctor. I can only say he very nearly killed me; it’s not her fault if I’m here today. She’s entirely unscrupulous, she gets a hold over people much too easily with her charm and her prestige and then forces her own values on them.’
‘Not on Fanny,’ Aunt Emily said, with confidence, ‘look at that chin.’
‘You always say look at Fanny’s chin but I never can see any other signs of her being strong-minded. Those Radletts make her do whatever they like.’
‘You’ll see,’ said Aunt Emily. ‘Siegfried is quite all right again by the way, he’s had a lovely walkies.’
‘Oh, good,’ said Davey. ‘Olive oil’s the thing.’
They both looked affectionately at the Pekingese, Siegfried.
But I wanted to get some more interesting gossip out of Davey about the Hamptons. I said coaxingly,
‘Go on Dave, do go on telling about Lady Montdore. What was she like when she was young?’
‘Exactly the same as she is now.’
I sighed. ‘No, but I mean what did she look like?’
‘I tell you, just the same,’ said Davey. ‘I’ve known her ever since I was a little tiny boy and she hasn’t changed one scrap.’
‘Oh, Davey –’ I began. But I left it at that. It’s no good, I thought, you always come up against this blank wall with old people, they always say about each other that they have never looked any different, and how can it be true? Anyway, if
