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By Root 290 0

we tried,” she said, “nothing seemed to work.” She sighed reminiscently. This remark hung rather heavily in the atmosphere; Monica brooded, while I wished that I had left earlier, with Mme de Bonneuil. Then, after twelve years of selfless and dedicated “trying”, Mrs Pusey’s efforts were rewarded, and lo and behold, there was Jennifer. “My husband always wanted a little girl.” Here she turned to Jennifer, who flashed her an altogether expected smile and lovingly held out her hand. Thus encouraged, Mrs Pusey went on to regale us with anecdotes of Jennifer’s early years. Needless to say, these were all they would have hoped for, although she was outrageously spoiled. “Well, when you’ve waited so long, you tend to give them everything they want, don’t you? And my husband couldn’t bear to see her in tears. It upset him dreadfully. Iris, he used to say, let her have the best. I’ll leave you a blank cheque. And so we did, and she’s none the worse for a bit of spoiling, are you, darling?” Again, the smile, the outstretched hand. And certainly Jennifer’s glossy health would seem a more than adequate repayment for such efforts, on which, for some obscure reason, Mrs Pusey had to be congratulated all over again. I have to tell you, David, that among other things, Jennifer had a pony called Twig-let. And then we had the full recital again: Haslemere, Head Office, and how she has everything delivered.’

Edith laid down her pen. This letter would have to be finished later, and even possibly revised. Unsound elements seemed to have crept into her narrative; she was aware of exceeding her brief. And was then aware of the restrictions that that brief implied: to amuse, to divert, to relax – these had been her functions, and indeed her dedicated aim. But something had gone wrong or was slipping out of control. What had been undertaken as an exercise in entertainment – for had not the situation seemed appropriate, tailor-made, for such an exercise? – had somehow accumulated elements of introspection, of criticism, even of bitterness. ‘Well, darling, what news from Cranford?’ David used to say, stretching out his long arm to gather her to him as they sat on her big sofa. And that had always been her cue to present him with her gentle observations, always skilfully edited, and to watch the lines of fatigue on his lean and foxy face dissolve into a smile. For that is how he saw me, she thought, and out of love for him that is how I tried to be.

But now, possibly because of the champagne, she felt unsettled, wary. There seemed to be no immediate reason for this except fatigue, stretched nerves. The evening, of course, had gone on far too long after an extraordinary day. At some point, Monica had started to tell her story to Mrs Pusey, who listened with avid interest masked by an air of solicitous condescension. There seemed to be no means of escape. Jennifer, one ankle balanced on the opposite knee, this attitude permitted by the entirely modest amplitude of her harem pants, yet still managing to be both childish and inappropriate, seemed to have absented herself once more behind her docile face. She lay back in her chair, toying with her curls, her eyes watching from under half-closed lids; from her teeth a tiny thread of saliva hung glistening. Edith swallowed invisible yawns. She was aware that even Mr Neville was mildly inattentive, although his habitual courtesy of expression gave nothing away.

They had still been there at midnight. Monica, once launched, was not to be side-tracked, and cigarette after cigarette was smoked. And Mrs Pusey had nothing really helpful to offer in the way of advice; indeed, memories of her own term of trial, so successfully concluded, inclined her only to bracing clichés, which had not gone down too well. Monica’s face had drooped into its habitual lines of discontent, and the evening had ended on a distinctly less harmonious note than that on which it had started, and, at one point, had bid fair to continue. At least Kiki was absent, shut into Monica’s bathroom again by Alain after yet another misdemeanour.