Tea At Gunter's Read online

  ‘But it says – no uniform!’

  ‘There’s a terrible list of rules in the corridor –’

  ‘An even worse one in the la-ta. Have you seen that?’

  In the afternoon we were introduced to shorthand, Miss Metcalfe’s particular, consuming interest, (‘A skill, Ladies, which will repay every moment spent. We shall be spending many.’) and to book-keeping.

  It seemed a long time till four o’clock, and by the time I reached home, I was exhausted. My mother was waiting, avid for detail, leaning forward, hand cupping her chin. She’d made a large tea, which was unusual for her. Edgily hungry I wolfed down cake, disappointing her with my non-committal answers.

  She didn’t want to hear about the work.

  ‘The girls, Lucy. What were the girls like? Who did you go to lunch with?’

  ‘With Marjorie,’ I said.

  ‘But Marjorie who?’

  I didn’t know, and hadn’t asked. In any case, she hadn’t been at all what my mother, falsely, imagined as the typical White Rose student. In the next desk to mine, she’d kept looking across at me appealingly during the typing lesson; I’d noticed her hands particularly, clumsy and red with cold even in the airless centrally heated room. She’d been having trouble centring her machine: pushing hopelessly at all the knobs, looking quietly desperate. At lunch, she’d been one of the last to go, and we’d drifted out together. Over egg and tomato sandwiches, she told me that horses were her real life. It was her parents who’d insisted she did a secretarial training first. ‘I’ll never stick it,’ she said miserably, her eyes filling with tears.

  ‘She’s something to do with horses,’ I told my mother.

  ‘Racing, you mean? There is the Littlejohn family. He owns those racing stables. Their daughter would be of a White Rose age…’

  But she couldn’t make much of it really; and I couldn’t help her. Nevertheless something that I’d said must have satisfied her for very soon after she announced happily that she’d planned a special first night of term supper. ‘A ragout of beef. I’ve already made it, Lucy. And I’ve saved some farm eggs to make a custard.’

  With a fatalism born of experience, I watched her evening collapse. The custard curdled and no additions of precious yolk were able to save it; my father, who was in a hurry to go out, irritated her by smoking throughout the meal; he also assumed, justified by previous experience, that the stew was whalemeat.

  ‘If you gave up even five minutes to eating it,’ she said, her brow twitching angrily, ‘you’d realize it was beef.’

  ‘I’ve learnt the hard way. How do you think I manage,’ he asked, pressing his cigarette butt on to the plate, ‘except I try not to taste any of it?’

  Spooning up our grainy custard neither my mother nor I mentioned the White Rose. Possibly he’d forgotten. When I’d come down that morning he had already left, and he’d been out the two evenings before. But she was too angry, and I was too proud, to remind him of it now.

  Chapter Five

  I hadn’t told my mother about Alan, and when I did, she wasn’t at all pleased. She’d hoped, she said, I was going to concentrate on the White Rose and not gad about; there would be time enough for that in London. ‘And heaven knows, Lucy, what type you attracted in that dreadful dress.’

  She insisted on meeting him first, but there were several Holdsworths in the Bratherton directory, and before I could track him down I had to ask four times, redfaced, ‘Is Alan there?’ She wanted him to come to tea on Saturday. Alan, sounding pleased but surprised, said yes, he’d love to come.

  It was not a success. Right from the beginning, wincing when he said ‘pleased to meet you,’ my mother showed how it was that she’d earned her nickname the Duchess of Bratherton’. When Alan, asked to admire Pugin sleekly dozing on her knee, revealed apologetically that he didn’t really like cats, she lifted Pugin from her lap and without further comment crossed the room and opened the door; Pugin with great dignity stalked out. From then onwards matters grew steadily worse. As Alan’s shyness wore off his nervousness increased; he seemed unable to stop talking. Perched on the edge of the sofa, at intervals drying his clammy hands on his trousers, he talked about his hobbies (hiking, dancing, engine-spotting); about his home life, his four brothers and sisters, his father who was a lay preacher, ‘I’m a keen Methodist myself; and about his job and prospects. ‘Anyone would think he’d come to ask for your hand,’ said my mother scornfully afterwards. By the time he left, still apologizing for Pugin’s unnecessary exile, I’d begun against my will to see him through her eyes. It was as if by some alchemy she managed in spite of what I realized to be unpardonable behaviour to keep me on her side always.

  I knew this from experience. Several years before, triumphant in my love for the art teacher, Miss Greenwood, I’d invited her to tea one holiday afternoon: certain that her talent and beauty, her aura of suffering (only a few months before her pilot fiancé had been shot down in flames) could not fail to impress. But like Alan’s visit, it had gone wrong from the start. My love arrived pink-nosed, apologetic, with a streaming cold; the room was dank and chilly and my mother, who had made the coal shortage an excuse for not lighting the fire till the last possible moment, intimated graciously that because of her asthma she was particularly susceptible to infection. ‘Of course, you couldn’t possibly have known …’ Looking cold and uncomfortable, Miss Greenwood sat dabbing at her sore nose; long strands of fine hair escaped from her clumsily rolled bun. Usually it was part of her charm that she looked untidy and wild: in art classes, between rushes around our work, she would lean across the desk – her blouse pulling out of her skirt – writing excited sprawling letters to her fiancé, spattered with exclamation marks and underlinings; by the end of the lesson her hair would have fallen halfway down her back. That afternoon, I’d just sat unhappily, knowing something was wrong but not sure exactly what, while my mother by a series of questions unearthed the fact that Miss Greenwood’s father was a railway porter and that her Christian name was Gertie (I had been certain it was Gwendolen).

  ‘Of course I’m sure she’s excellent at her subject, and all that,’ said my mother afterwards, ‘but she is a little pathetic, don’t you think?’

  At the time, I felt only a great sadness: a guiltiness that I hadn’t leapt to Miss Greenwood’s defence. But back at school next term, all was changed: she seemed to me dull and uninteresting, and a poor teacher – more to be pitied than admired. And although for Alan I felt as yet only easy friendship, gratitude at being rescued that evening, I saw already that it was to be the same old story.

  The next day began badly. It was our Sunday for visiting my grandparents, and my mother, who detested the fortnightly ritual, was awkward and belligerent all morning. She often got out of going by some convenient illness; but today she’d obviously decided against this and instead, I well knew, was going to sit the afternoon out, scarcely speaking but wearing a faint smile all the time as if she had some secret. Lunch had been late, and just as we were about to leave Pugin was sick on the front door mat. My father was furious; he disliked all cats and Pugin in particular. Sending me to clear up the mess he went out to crank the Hillman, while my mother ran distractedly into the kitchen to see what was wrong. Nothing much was. Pugin was safely asleep in his Lloyd Loom chair; but she was alarmed nevertheless. Although fat and stiff and old now and very different from the fluffy kitten of 1940 taken in for some evacuees who’d wanted to return home, Pugin was still an object of much love and solicitude: his death something she didn’t want to think about.

  ‘For me, you see, Lucy, he’s connected with Patmore. You do understand, don’t you, darling?’

  As I’d known the cat long before I’d heard of the architect, the two were inextricably confused in my mind; but it appeared that Pugin had been responsible for adding a chapel to Patmore in the middle of the last century. (‘All that bloody red and purple,’ my father said once. ‘I don’t know what was up with him.’) My mother having chosen the na
me, was delighted: it was short, expletive, a little esoteric, and most important of all, it meant she could be reminded several times a day of Patmore; when Pugin misbehaved, clawing at stockings, scratching the furniture, then she had the added satisfaction of using his full name: ‘You bad boy, Augustus Welby Pugin!’

  We set off for Harrogate at last. My grandparents lived not far from the Valley Gardens, up a little sidestreet – they’d moved there from Leeds in the nineteen thirties, when my grandfather sold up his shop and retired. It was a small house, painted dull brown in and out, its pseudo-leaded windows draped with net curtains which smelt strongly always of Sunlight soap; and except for the kitchen, and the front room on Sundays, it was always freezing.

  My grandmother was already at the tiny porch to greet us. ‘Father and I’d all but given you up!’ she exclaimed. A small, efficient mouse-coloured person, she was dressed as nearly always in a grey jersey suit, her thin hair worn shingled, her actions all quick and nervous, so that she looked considerably less than her seventy-five years.

  In the front room, my grandfather was sitting by the Sunday fire; a semi-invalid for some years now, he spent most of his time in the kitchen in a basket chair padded round with cushions, except for occasional short walks seldom stirring out of his brown carpet slippers. I came over now and kissed him: he was big and burly and with so much moustache and beard, some of the auburn still visible amongst the grey, that it was often difficult to find anywhere to kiss. Today I settled for his forehead.

  Although I often felt ill at ease with my grandmother, who tended to give me sudden, sharp, critical looks for no apparent reason, with my grandfather I was always relaxed. I had a tough, unanalysed affection for him. And like my affection for Elizabeth, my mother’s comments merely bounced off it. ‘He seems to have got very grubby with old age,’ she had remarked last time (not without truth, for although my grandmother did much mopping and sponging, his dark jacket seemed always stained now with tea or whisky or a mixture of both), but I’d paid her little attention.

  When I’d kissed him I sat down in my usual place, on the leather pouf with diamond-shaped patches, close to his chair. My mother was sitting awkwardly on the horsehair sofa, well away from my father. Gazing into the middle distance, she smiled occasionally to herself.

  ‘I heard from Arnold, Friday,’ said my grandmother, coming into the room carrying a fat envelope. ‘I’m to be a great-grandmother again!’

  We heard about Uncle Arnold most visits. He was manager now of a small factory for electrical parts near Glasgow, and rarely came down to Yorkshire. When he did however, my mother kept out of his way. Big, heavy, like my grandfather in physique, he was a practical joker (on his first visit to Leeds after my mother left Patmore, he’d put a farting cushion under her chair). But most important of all, he had never, from the very beginning, thought the marriage had a chance. (That he’d been proved right only made it worse.)

  My grandmother began reading the letter aloud, making comments as she went along. He wrote a rather dull letter: laboured, ponderous with detail. There were several sheets to come yet, and bored, I let my eyes wander, following round the photographs which hung all along one wall and ranged the length of the sideboard. Everyone seemed to be there. All the Taylors and I’llng-worths I knew about; and many that I didn’t. The famous Ethel: in Land Army breeches, solemn-faced and surprised-looking, barely recognizable as the girl described so affectionately by my mother; Uncle Norman, weedy and not very tall, unbelievably young-looking in private’s uniform. Uncle Arnold himself, head and shoulders only, dressed for football. My father – first as an early boy scout, bullet-headed, frowning, then later, in stiff new Sam Browne, as an officer. There was even Aunt Lucy as a prim, tight-bodiced, moustacheless young girl. And many, many more. It didn’t seem that a picture had ever been put away that could be put out.

  ‘Lucy’s off dreaming,’ said my grandmother, folding the letter and getting up. ‘She can give me a hand to get the tea.’

  I went through with her to the kitchen. It wasn’t a very big room and an enormous range took up most of the space, giving out an almost unbearable heat. My grandfather’s basket chair was drawn up to the table, which was crammed with food. Rich dark parkin, moist from the apples it was stored with, fruit loaf, cold fat bacon, apple pie and cheese, Yorkshire curd tart. It had always been like this ever since I could remember, even in the worst days of the War. There was a confident assured air about it all too – a custard for instance, would never have curdled for my grandmother.

  My mother ate little during the meal. She had remarked often that this was an uncivilized hour to eat: ‘However, it’s what they’ve been brought up to Lucy, and you are never to comment,’ (I had not been going to). ‘After all, noblesse oblige.’

  My grandfather was spreading mustard thickly over his bacon. ‘A little bird told me you’ve a young man now, Lucy,’ he said, taking a noisy gulp of his tea and spilling some of it onto the large napkin tied under his chin.

  ‘It wasn’t a little bird at all,’ said my mother sharply. ‘You get all your information from Peter. Peter was over here last night’

  My grandmother, pursing her lips together, said, ‘Father’s only showing interest, Winifred.’

  She didn’t say any more, but lifting up the teapot carried it over to the stove; my father muttered something which I didn’t hear. While her back was turned my grandfather poured a swig of whisky into his cup from a bottle hidden amongst the cushions: he winked at me and I winked back, and I saw my father give him a quick, friendly look.

  My grandmother came back to the table. Turning to me she said, ‘This White Rose, now, we’ve not heard much of it, Lucy. We’ve nothing but what your father’s told us.’

  I caught sight of my mother’s expression. Her superior smile, which she couldn’t keep while eating and drinking anyway, had begun to fade, so that she looked to me pathetic, and I began to feel protective immediately. I said carefully:

  ‘Well, we have to work very hard of course.’ I described the school a little. ‘But it’s all very interesting.’

  My grandmother was pouring out tea. ‘It sounds very fancy to me,’ she said. ‘And it’ll give you ideas.’ She reached over for my mother’s cup, filling it without asking her. ‘You’re wasting your money, Winifred. Next thing, she’ll be courting and wed – and not a penny back.’

  This was the first remark, in my hearing, that she’d ever made about the project. I suppose I’d realized that they must have discussed it at some time: the Patmore legacy, the uses to which it was to be put, and so on; at no time had my father ever hinted that he didn’t believe my mother’s story. But it was a rare thing for my grandmother to comment openly. Although in the circumstances neither of them could have been by now very fond of my mother, very little was said, apart from the odd remark now and then: the ‘oh, well, Winifred’ which I heard sometimes, when I went there alone with my father. On the whole, I think the situation was accepted like Acts of God and the weather. Not much to do about it.

  Today my mother let the remark pass. In the close atmosphere of the kitchen she was beginning to look very flushed and as always when she was too hot, her hair gave the illusion of being too heavy for her head. But I could see that my father was growing more and more annoyed with her; and a few moments later, he showed this by making some reference to the elocution lessons she’d arranged. (I wasn’t even sure how he’d heard of them.)

  ‘So you see, that’s not all with the legacy. There’s money gone on brown cows too.’

  I blushed. My mother cast him a look of dignified hate.

  ‘What’s that, eh, what’s that?’ asked my grandfather; then began to laugh before he’d seen any joke. I didn’t say anything: and my father didn’t repeat the remark. My grandmother who was clearing the table hadn’t seemed to hear.

  We left soon after. There was a wireless programme my grandparents always listened to on Sunday evenings and my mother found it very convenient to re
mind them of this: she herself always listened to the Radio Doctor on Friday mornings, so she knew, she said, how it was.

  My grandfather, leaning forward in his chair, kissing me goodbye, said, ‘Be nice to that young man, Lucy!’ His moustache was wet and smelt strongly of whisky. Just as we were leaving, feeling a surge of affection for him because of his warm undemanding approval of me, I ran back to kiss him again.

  We were alone in the kitchen. As I was moving away he began to mumble, but as if to himself. ‘She’d do best not to come, you know,’ he said, twice. ‘There’s nothing right. Nothing suits. She’d do best not to come.’ He reached forward for his cup and took a few big gulps. ‘There’s no pleasing Winifred, she’d do best not to come. Aye,’ he said, ‘that’d be best – that’s right. Taken all round, that’s best.’

  Then he noticed I was still there. He winked at me rather sheepishly.

  ‘You haven’t to tell her,’ he said.

  The next Tuesday I began with Miss Lister. My lesson was for five o’clock, but we’d had our first shorthand test that afternoon and hungry after the strain, I made a swift, expensive visit to Fuller’s; then I realized that I was going to be late and ran all the way, so that when I eventually arrived at Miss Lister’s address in the Cold Bath Road I was not only apprehensive but breathless as well.

  I didn’t know anything about elocution teachers and the image I’d made for myself was of someone bustling and efficient – a sort of gymnast of the vocal cords; the reality of Miss Lister however, was something quite other. Her first words to me as she stood dramatically on her front step, were ‘You are Lucy!’ spoken in a deep, vibrating voice. Then repeating, ‘You are Lucy,’ with a sweeping gesture, she led me inside.

  Tall and horsefaced, dressed in a tight black silk blouse, her brown cobwebby hair piled up high, she struck awe into me at once. As we walked through the hall, the hem of her long velvet skirt trailing along the linoleum, she said in a sad tone, ‘Pupils should arrive at least ten minutes before their lesson is due. Where is your breath, Lucy?’ Her own as she leant towards me, smelt of violet cachoux.