Hotel du Lac - Anita Brookner [18]
Tea was being served, and to Edith’s surprise it was being served to a number of people whom she had not seen before. More young waiters than she had previously noticed were busy at tables filled by groups of men in high good humour, animated by cordial discussion; one or two looked up as she passed, then returned to the more urgent matter of business that had brought them here, from the conference in Geneva, for a last informal meeting before they all went their separate ways. For the first time, Edith was aware of the hotel as a well populated organism, its attendants merely resting until an appropriate occasion should summon them to present themselves, serious and anxious to give service, at an appointed time. That time, it seemed, had now arrived. M. Huber, at the desk, getting in his son-in-law’s way, smiled, nodded, and suggested difficult alterations to the menu for dinner.
To this scene of animation, her nose wrinkling slightly at the unusual smell of cigarette smoke, came Mrs Pusey, late as usual, and perhaps a little tired after a day which had not yielded the required amount of shopping. They had been after a particular kind of blouse, with drawn-thread work, she explained to Edith, who was drawn to Mrs Pusey’s table from her own as if by some magnetic force, but there had been a disappointment. The little woman who used to make the blouses had just disappeared, without giving them any sort of notice, although she was well aware that Mrs Pusey and Jennifer came over every year and always gave her a substantial order. And sent her a Christmas card. ‘But there you are,’ said Mrs Pusey. ‘The old days of service have disappeared, even in Switzerland. It’s not my world any longer.’ She gave a little smile. ‘No, everything has changed, and not for the better, either. But one thing I will not do is lower my standards. I have always striven for the best. It’s an instinct, I suppose. As my husband used to say, Only the best is good enough.’
‘Mummy,’ cried Jennifer hotly. ‘You are the best.’ She grasped her mother’s hand, and both sets of eyes took on the brave glisten of the recently bereaved, although even if the bereavement was occasioned by the disloyal specialist in drawn-thread work, Edith reflected, there was little she could offer in the way of consolation. While the, to her, extraordinary communion between mother and daughter was demonstrated once again, she studied Jennifer, who always seemed to her as inexpressive as a blank window, although all her gestures were vigorous and all her interventions emphatic. Jennifer was a splendid specimen, she acknowledged, an effortless testimonial to her mother’s care. Her large fair face, perhaps a little too sparsely populated by a cluster of rather small features, shone with the ruddy health of an unsuspecting child. Everything about her gleamed. Her light blue eyes, her regular, slightly incurving teeth, her faultless skin, all gave off various types of sheen; her blonde hair looked almost dusty in comparison. Her rather plump artless body was, Edith saw, set forth by clothes which were far from artless and possibly too narrow; Jennifer managed to give the impression that she was growing out of them. Everything about her was as expensive as her mother’s money could make it, but in a different style from Mrs Pusey’s careful elegance.