A Buyers Market - Anthony Powell [44]
“Who is this extraordinary old puss you have in tow?” Stringham had asked, while he and I had walked a little ahead of the other three, after we had left the coffee-stall.
“A friend of my parents.”
“Mine know the oddest people too—especially my father. And Miss Jones? Also a friend—or a cousin?”
He only laughed when I attempted to describe the circumstances that had led to my finding myself with Mr. Deacon, who certainly seemed to require some explanation at the stage of life, and of behaviour, that he had now reached. Stringham pretended to think—or was at least unwilling to disbelieve—that Gypsy Jones was my own chosen companion, rather than Mr. Deacon’s. However, he had shown no sign of regarding either of them as noticeably more strange than anyone else, encountered on a summer night, who might seem eligible to be asked to a party given by a friend. It was, indeed, clear to me that strangeness was what Stringham now expected, indeed, demanded from life: a need already become hard to satisfy. The detachment he had always seemed to possess was now more marked than ever before. At the same time he had become in some manner different from the person I had known at school, so that, in spite of the air almost of relief that he had shown at falling in with us, I began to feel uncertain whether, in fact, Anne Stepney had not used the term “pompous” in the usual, and not some specialised, sense. Peter Templer, too, I remembered had employed the same word years before at school when he had inquired about Stringham’s family. “Well, I imagine it was all rather pompous even at lunch, wasn’t it?” he had asked. At that time I associated pomposity with Le Bas, or even with Widmerpool, both of whom habitually indulged in mannerisms unthinkable in Stringham. Yet there could be no doubt that he now possessed a personal remoteness, a kind of preoccupation with his own affairs, that gave at least some prima facie excuse for using the epithet. All the rather elaborate friendliness, and apparent gratitude for the meeting—almost as if it might offer means of escape from some burdensome commitment—was unquestionably part of a barrier set up against the rest of the world. Trying to disregard the gap, of which I felt so well aware, as it yawned between us, I asked about his family.
“My father sits in Kenya, quarrelling with his French wife.”
“And your mother?”
“Similarly occupied with Buster over here.”
“At Glimber?”
“Glimber—as arranged by Buster—is let to an Armenian. They now live in a house of more reasonable proportions at Sunningdale. You must come there one day—if only to see dawn breaking over the rock garden. I once arrived there in the small hours and had that unforgettable experience.”
“Is Buster still in the Navy?”
“Not he.”
“A gentleman of leisure?”
“But much humbled. No longer expects one to remember every individual stroke he made during the polo season.”
“So you both rub along all right?”
“Like a house on fire,” said Stringham. “All the same, you know parents—especially step-parents—are sometimes a bit of a disappointment to their children. They don’t fulfil the promise of their early years. As a matter of fact, Buster may come to the party if he can get away.”
“And Miss Weedon?”
“Tuffy has left. I see her sometimes. She came into a little money. My mother changes her secretary every week now. She can’t get along with anyone since Tuffy resigned.”
“What about Peggy Stepney?”
“What, indeed?”
“I sat next to her sister, Anne, at dinner to-night.”
“Poor Anne, I hope you were kind to her.”
He gave no hint as to whether or not he was still involved with Peggy Stepney. I presumed that there was at least no longer any question of an engagement.
“Are you still secretary to Sir Magnus Donners?”
“Still to be seen passing from time to time through the Donners-Brebner Buildings,” said Stringham,