Chapter VI
THE PERFECT GUEST
Ursula stood in front of the looking-glass inspecting the angle of her hat. It was a new hat. She had put it on to impress Mary. Mary dressed rather like the worthier type of village school teacher. She wore flannel blouses with high collars. It was time some one took her in hand. "There's something about looking after a parish that makes a woman forget to powder her nose," thought Ursula.
Ursula had come to Anderby on a mission of mercy. She was going to brighten Mary up. Mary had been shut away too long with that extraordinarily dull husband of hers. She thought that the only thing a married woman could do, if she had any time left over from looking after her own household, was to look after some one else's. Well, Ursula was going to show her that there were lots of other things to do. The perfect guest was one who contributed something to the life of her hostess. Ursula was going to teach Mary how to dress, and play bridge, and behave like a girl of twenty-eight instead of a woman of forty. And yet she would be tender and gentle, with the tenderness of expectant motherhood—fashionable yet considerate, thoughtful yet spontaneous.
Ursula found continual pleasure in the contemplation of her own spontaneity.
Mary re-entered the drawing-room, carrying a tea-tray. Now was the time, thought Ursula, to lay her fur coat carelessly on the sofa, and reveal the soft grey draperies of her satin dress. What a mercy she looked so much nicer than most women in these circumstances. It just showed there was no real need to let yourself go.
But Mary did not seem to notice the dress.
"We're having a cup of tea now," she explained, arranging the tray on the table, "because I expect you would like one after your drive, and I have to go out down the village on an errand."
"When? Now?"
Then she would not be present while Ursula spread on the antiquated dressing-table the elaborate paraphernalia of her toilette—bottles, scent, powder, manicure instruments. She would not be instructed by the display of Ursula's fairy-like lingerie. She would miss part of her education.
"I'm sorry if it seems rude, but it's rather important. I dare say you will be glad of a rest, though."
"It's something that's worrying you, Mary. What?"
"Worrying me? Why, whatever makes you think I'm worrying?"
"My dear, you're hardly an expert at disguising your feelings. Do you mind if I have a cigarette? Now then, come along! Confession is good for the soul."
Mary must be worried if she was too preoccupied to notice the fur coat.
"I'm only going to see the schoolmaster about a boy John wants to come and work on the farm this spring. The schoolmaster says he hasn't reached the sixth standard yet, and doesn't want him to leave school."
"What are you going to do, then?"
"I'm going to Coast to tell him that the boy is thirteen and has put in his attendances. If he hasn't got to the sixth standard now, he never will. He's keen on sheep and hates lessons. On the farm he'll be getting experience as well as making money. It's absurd to keep him sitting at a desk chalking coloured flowers!"
"Oh, you talk to the schoolmaster like that, do you? But isn't there something about education acts and things? I don't know much about it. It's not my line, but the kid seems pretty young."
Ursula was not at all interested in lads and education acts. She wanted to talk about her own interesting condition or Mary's style of hairdressing. But she had made up her mind to be patient, and patient she would be.
"Mr. Woodcock," continued Mary with heat, "says in the Yorkshire Chronicle that the people who make education acts are legislating for the normal majority. It is the business of local knowledge to determine the exceptions."
"My dear Mary, you talk like a Member of Parliament. Are you really interested in these things?"
"Rural education? Yes, of course."
"Why 'of course'? I'm not. I never put my nose inside Middlethorpe. I don't know if there's a village school or not except when the beastly bell rings in the morning—and yet Foster seems to do pretty well on the farm."
"It's not entirely a question of money though, is it?"
Mary looked at Ursula with grave, wide eyes.
"Isn't it? Philanthropy, then, and all that sort of thing, I suppose. Does your schoolmaster enjoy it when you snatch his lambs away from him? Does he, Mary?"
She laughed.
"No. I don't believe he does. But that's not the point."
"I don't really see that there is a point to it at all."
Ursula lit one cigarette from another and threw the dead end into the grate. She did not like smoking a lot just now, but really, with Mary——
"Well, some one's got to do it," said Mary.
"Why? Do what?"
"Oh, see that nurses are provided and that the girls get situations and—oh, I don't know. Besides, I like it."
"Of course." Ursula smiled pityingly. "I suppose when you have so few other ties——"
Mary flushed.
Ursula continued:
"You look tired. I'm sure you do too much. I shall speak to John about it. Why don't you go in for golf?"
"Golf? I shouldn't be any good at that I'm afraid. Besides Hardrascliffe links are so far away. I haven't time."
"Time? Of course you have time. As much time as anyone. As me, for instance."
Mary shook her head slowly, and began to gather up the tea-things.
"You'll excuse me going away now, won't you? I shan't be long. You'll just have nice time to unpack comfortably and I expect John will be in any moment now."
She left the room.
Ursula curled herself comfortably on the sofa and putting another cushion behind her head, prepared to enjoy a grievance. Really it was rather casual of Mary to go and leave her just after her arrival. She did not seem to realize her good fortune in having her cousin there at all. "She's hopelessly limited and narrow-minded. Poor Mary! Anybody so thoroughly pleased with herself must be disillusioned one day. She'll come a cropper soon," prophesied Ursula.
She was too tired to go upstairs and dress. Besides, what was the use, when John and Mary never changed for high tea?
Her head sank back among the cushions.
"Oh, that you, Ursula? How are you?"
John stood before her holding out a polite but rather grimy hand. His beard was grizzled with frost. His farming boots distributed little pools of melting ice on the carpet. Leather breeches encased his great legs.
Ursula sat up and patted her perfectly-ordered hair.
"Good gracious! I must have been dozing. How are you, John? I'm perfectly fit, thanks."
"Where's Mary?"
"She's gone off up the village somewhere. I say, John, you ought to keep an eye on that wife of yours. She works much too hard."
John tugged at his beard and smiled lazily down at Ursula.
"Oh, I can't stop her. If she wants to do anything she will. What's she up to now?"
"She's off to tell the schoolmaster some home-truths about a lad or something. She says you want him on the farm and he's under age."
"Jack Greenwood? I don't want him. That's her idea. How long has she been gone?"
"Oh, I don't know. Ages. Do sit down and talk to me."
John looked apologetically at his boots. Near Ursula's fragile daintiness he felt more than ever conscious of his bulk and clumsiness.
"Where's Foster?" he asked.
"He's away in Scotland buying stock. He's crazy about crossing something or other with Highland Cattle. I don't know." Ursula seemed preoccupied. Her brow was ruffled with thought. "John, does Mary always rule things in the village in this high-handed way?"
"What? I dun' know. That's her business. I never interfere."
"But don't you see she's wearing herself out? Making an old woman of herself while she ought to be still a girl? Besides, after all, you're the farmer, aren't you? Of course," with a sigh, "I know she's magnificent."
"Oh—ay."
"But it must make it a little uncomfortable for every one if she will set the village by the ears."
John sat silent for a minute. Ursula lay and watched him, her sharp brown eyes quietly searching his ruminative face. There was something about John that reminded her of an ox—large, docile, fated. "Well, it's nowt to do with me," he said at last. "I'd better go and clear away some of this mess. So long."
He left her.
Well, it was evident that nothing could be done with John. She would have to concentrate on Mary. The determination to reform her cousin-in-law's existence pursued her throughout the evening. It would be an entertaining game, the sole relief of a rather monotonous visit to otherwise boring people.
Next morning she was awakened by Mary, standing over her bed with the breakfast tray. One irritating thing about Mary was that she always seemed to be carrying trays somewhere.
"Good heavens! What's the time?"
"Half-past eight. John wanted breakfast at a quarter past seven this morning. He had to go to Littledale early."
"Well, it's awfully ripping of you, but you know you shouldn't spoil me."
"It's not a question of spoiling," returned Mary serenely. "I couldn't let you get up so early, especially as I don't suppose you feel quite at your best in the mornings just now."
How like Mary to emphasize the unromantic aspect of a really rather romantic thing! Ursula surveyed the tray which Mary arranged in a businesslike fashion by her side. Mary's manner always reminded Ursula vaguely of a hospital nurse. She made you feel as if you weren't a person at all, but only an object of her philanthropy.
Ursula decided that the time had come to assert her personality. "Oh, Mary, I'm so sorry, but do you mind if I don't eat this bacon? I never take it now, nothing but an egg or a scrap of fish. No, no! Don't take it away. I might perhaps try to manage it."
"Oh, for goodness' sake don't eat it if it would upset you. I ought to have asked last night. It was silly of me. You really should have told me. And perhaps you'd rather have tea instead of coffee?"
"Oh, no. Don't bother. I couldn't think of troubling you. I'll manage with coffee this morning. It mayn't make me ill." Ursula smiled brightly.
"Oh, does it make you sick? I'll bring some tea in a minute."
Mary vanished from the room and Ursula lay and wondered whether it was worth while getting out of bed to brush her hair before Mary returned. Just like Mary to come in and find her asleep with dishevelled hair and her face still covered with the cream she had put on before retiring. It was not at all in keeping with the effect she had intended to produce. But perhaps Mary hadn't noticed much. Ursula climbed out of bed, wincing as her toes touched the cold carpet. There were always such appalling draughts in these old houses. A rug against the door would be a good thing. She mentally recorded the suggestion.
A deft fingering of her dark hair and the addition of a rosy satin wrap transformed Ursula. She snuggled back among the pillows as Mary came in bearing a teapot, an egg-cup, a hot water-bottle and a shawl.
"There now," she said. "That's better, isn't it? Now put this shawl round your shoulders. It's cold this morning, isn't it?"
"Thanks awfully. No I don't want the shawl, thanks. I have my wrap. It was sweet of you to think of it, though."
"Would you care to come out a little later?"
"I'd love to. I'm longing to see this wonderful village of yours." She shivered a little.
"Are you cold? Do have the shawl."
"No, thanks, but perhaps if you don't mind shutting the door."
"Well, then, I'll come for the tray presently. Don't hurry down. Have you a book? I left a few on the table. Have you everything you want?"
"Yes, rather. Thanks awfully. And what about a bath? Do I just ring when I'm ready or what? I could go along myself of course, only I don't want to give any trouble. Perhaps Violet——"
"Violet's busy this morning. I'm sorry we haven't got a bathroom yet. I'll bring some cans up to your room."
"Not a bathroom? Poor things! Why, if I don't have my bath every morning I feel perfectly filthy. And bathing in one's room is such a chill-some business, isn't it?"
"I'm afraid it is really. But you shall have a fire. I'll light one now." She lit the fire and went out, leaving Ursula alone with the tray.
Ursula waited quarter of an hour for Mary in the hall, and while she waited, she reluctantly yielded to an increasing sense of irritation. She had come to Anderby prepared to be very nice to Mary—and here was Mary trying to patronize her all the time. All that breakfast in bed, and fire and bath business had subtly transferred Ursula from the position of a friend to that of a dependent. "Perfection of service lies in the appearance of rendering none," quoted Ursula to herself, and decided she was badly used.
And when Mary at last appeared in the hall, she came forward with an apology which implied no shame but was merely a statement of courtesy.
"I'm sorry I kept you waiting, but the butcher's cart came round and then Mrs. Walker brought me her nursing subscription."
"Oh, don't worry about me. I've been as right as a trivet—only waiting about half an hour. Where are we going?"
"Well, if you don't mind I want to go up to the churchyard. Old Jacob Jordan died a day or two ago. They're burying him to-morrow and I sent a man up to line the grave with evergreen. The old people haven't much of a garden, and they do appreciate those little attentions."
"Do you go and decorate the grave yourself?"
"No, I only want to see how it's getting on. Here, let me open the gate. You'll spoil your gloves."
But Ursula was already tugging at the iron bars, and withdrew her hand, grimacing at the stripe of moisture across the doeskin gauntlet. She felt that it would have been becoming in Mary to show some sign of concern. But Mary only said quietly:
"You should have let me do it."
Ursula walked on for a little way in silence. Then she asked:
"Will you go to the funeral to-morrow?"
"Yes. If you'll excuse me for that time. It won't take long."
"Do you go to all their funerals?"
"The people in the village? Yes, mostly."
"Mary, how can you?"
"Why shouldn't I? I don't mind."
"Funerals are so beastly depressing. If you go to a lot you'll get morbid and queer."
"I shan't. I quite enjoy them."
"Enjoy them? Good Lord, that just shows how fearfully bad they are for you. Enjoying a funeral! I never heard of anything so grizzly."
"It's not a bit grizzly really. If you lived about here, you'd understand. People enjoy them nearly as much as weddings and a lot more than christenings."
"Oh, I see." Ursula cracked a frozen puddle with the point of her walking-stick. "A christening may be a farce and a wedding a fiasco, but you know where you are with a funeral."
"Yes, I suppose so," said Mary calmly.
They had turned from the village street into a path that led up the hill to the church. Ursula took up her tale.
"All the same, I think it's perfectly beastly, making a kind of beanfeast because somebody is going to be shut up in the earth. Do you know, if you don't mind I think I'd rather not go into the churchyard just now—an open grave, it always gives me the shudders. I can wait outside."
"Why, of course. How silly of me not to have thought about it. It doesn't matter. I can go another time. Let's turn down here."
"Here" meant past the School House.
"What a hideous place!" said Ursula.
"Oh, I don't know." Mary resented anyone else who criticized her village. "Why, there's the schoolmaster."
"Is he one of your adorers?" Ursula asked, looking with amusement at the lean, black coated figure carrying a pile of books from one building to another.
Mary flushed.
"Not exactly," she said, but as Mr. Coast approached she smiled at him graciously. "Good morning," she called. "A blustery morning, isn't it? How's Mrs. Coast?"
She was not going to let Ursula see that there was any fly in her ointment of patronage.
But Coast regarded her coldly without a sign of recognition. From her he turned to Ursula, in her fur coat and rakish hat. His scornful eyes swept across them and he turned away.
Ursula suppressed a giggle of triumph. This was the worship offered by Mary's beloved villagers. The family should hear of this. "What a rude man!" she remarked airily.
"I expect the sun was in his eyes," said Mary.
Ursula decided it would be tactful to change the conversation. Poor Mary! She looked like a lion tamer when Leo won't sit up and do his tricks!
"You know, Mary," she began with pretty diffidence, running her walking-stick along the path, "you're such a dear. I'd hate to see you spoiled, and living this sort of life must be rather dangerous—likely to get you into a groove."
"What sort of a groove?" asked Mary.
"Well, all this village work and so on. And sticking so closely to your house and everything, as if you were one of your own aunts."
Mary held herself well in hand.
"I thought I had explained all that before," she said patiently. "You see we've had to economize a lot because of the mortgage. We only started even having a maid last year, though we could have two easily in that house. And I do a lot of the garden myself, though it's really too big for me to manage. You know the mortgage had to be paid."
"That old mortgage seems to have been the bane of your life, Mary. Thank goodness it's paid now and you can forget it. You ought to play bridge and dance. Can you dance? You look as if you could. You move rippingly!" Ursula hummed a few bars from a popular waltz. "And then—I know it sounds awful cheek on my part, but couldn't you do something about your clothes?"
"My clothes?"
"Yes. You know, of course, I understand it's been awfully difficult for you. And we all think you've been perfectly splendid, the way you've toiled and pinched to pay those beastly debts, but now they're all done with couldn't you go to some one rather more enterprising for your coats and skirts? Of course I get mine in town, but I dare say you wouldn't want to go so far. Still, there's York and Hull and Scarborough. Oh, lots of places where there must be a decent tailor."
"I dare say. I can't afford it though. We're not millionaires yet. John must get some capital laid by."
"Still, I don't see why you shouldn't do things, especially as you haven't any children to keep you at home. Now I'm quite prepared to settle down for a bit after April but you really might be a bit more normal. Of course, it's been bad luck, having to save such a lot and all that, but it's all over now. You mustn't get in a groove."
Mary smiled, a queer, twisted smile.
So that was what they thought of the thing that had dictated the whole course of her life, forced her into marriage with a man old enough to be her father, and left her, now that youth was passing, deprived of every interest except her village work. Something that was all over, and might be comfortably forgotten.... Though, without it, she might be going to have a child as well as Ursula....
"Of course I dare say I've no right to say anything, Mary. You know it's only because you're such a dear really...."
Middle-aged. That was what Ursula said she was. Well, she often felt it. She supposed it must be with thinking about the same thing for so long. Monomania is an efficient destroyer of youth.
Well, if she was in a groove, there was no escape from it. Not by the easy way of tennis parties and bridge which Ursula suggested. She had placed herself irretrievably in the ranks of the older generation. If youth meant the adventuring towards an uncertain choice of life, then, when the choice was made, youth ended. Ten years ago Mary had made her choice. Henceforward she was captive in a "groove," and must descend in it steadily until the end of life, with no digressions that might lead her to the hill-tops of success or the valleys of humiliation.
She opened the gate for Ursula and passed behind her up the wintry garden.
Never mind! She would make it all worth while.
Anderby was going to be the most prosperous, popular, well cared for village in the East Riding before she had done with it. She'd show them.
She went along the passage with shining eyes and began to prepare dinner.
In spite of herself the elasticity of her youth had momentarily triumphed.
John followed her and stood in the doorway watching her with his slow smile.
She always knew when he had something to tell her. It was so irritating of him just to stand there without speaking. She thrust her tins into the oven and closed the door carefully before she looked up.
"Well?" she asked.
"Honey, I've just seen that chap Coast."
"Oh, have you? And what has he to say for himself?"
"He says that if you take young Greenwood away from school he'll report you to the Inspector and you'll have to answer for your action in Court."
John chuckled.
Mary tossed the oven cloth aside contemptuously. In the fine exaltation of her mood she could afford to laugh at Coast.
"Let him," she said. "I'd love to see him try to have me up before my betters. Think of old Sir Charles Seton's face when he saw me in the dock! He told Mr. Slater, when I was put on the Nursing Committee, that I was an estimable woman."
"Well, I wouldn't do anything rash if I were you."
"No, I'm sure you'd never do anything rash if you were anyone. Never mind. Go along and wash your hands. There's Yorkshire pudding for dinner, and it won't stand waiting."