Anglo-Saxon Attitudes by Angus Wilson

Author:Angus Wilson [Wilson, Angus]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2010-07-17T16:00:00+00:00

It was some weeks before Gerald got any reply to his letter to Mrs Salad, and when it did come it was not in the form he expected. 'There's a Mr Salad on the telephone for you, sir,' Mrs Larwood said one morning before he had risen from bed.

'Well, I can't speak to him now,' Gerald called to her.

'I told him that, but he says it's very important. It's about his grandmother.'

'Oh very well,' he answered. This comes of refusing to have an extension in my bedroom, he thought, as he pulled on a heavy dressing-gown. March gave no promise of relief from the cold wintry weather.

'Middleton speaking,' he called brusquely into the telephone.

It was obvious that his caller was put out, for an adenoidal voice said in nervous, though carefully refined tones, 'Oh! How do you do? My name's Vin Salad. I'm afraid it's frightfully early.'

'Yes,' Gerald said, 'it is. What do you want?'

'I'm ringing on account of Mrs Salad. She's my grandmother.'

'Yes,' answered Gerald. He was getting angry.

The caller's spirits seemed to be recovering from the original impact of Gerald's tone. The voice changed at a lightning speed from refined to cockney. Gerald could hardly hear the refined words, they were so swallowed; on the other hand, the cockney tones hit his ear somewhat painfully. 'My grandmother's been taken up,' came the cockney.

'Taken up?' Gerald queried. And then refined came the explanation. 'Yes, she's been arrested. On a charge of shop-lifting, it seems.'

Gerald was horrified at the prospect of Mrs Salad in the hands of the law. It hit his sentimental centre very hard. 'Poor old thing,' he whispered. 'Can I be of any help at all?' he asked.

'Well, I think you might be. I'm going up to the court with a friend. We're taking her up there together. But I think it might help if someone respectable was to speak for her. On her behalf,' Vin corrected himself.

Gerald, remembering what Mrs Salad had said, saw that Vin might not be altogether 'respectable'. 'Oh, certainly,' he said. 'I've not been her employer for many years, of course. But I've always kept up with her. Anyway, I'll do anything I can.'

'Well, actually, in my opinion, they'll only fine her. But I think it would do her a lot of good if you Were there.' The combination of the telephone, Gerald's masculinity, and his professorial rank had put Vin on a mettle of refinement that he seldom attempted. 'My friend Mr Rammage saw a solicitor last night and he's talking to one of the Welfare Officers this morning.' Gerald would have been surprised if he could have heard Vin's name for all these assisting people, including Gerald himself.

'Well, that all sounds very good,' said Gerald. 'What about her daughter Gladys? She always seemed to rely so much on her and her husband.'

Vin's voice took on its normal hard, deadly note. 'Oh did she?' he asked. 'Well, that's a mistake she won't make no more. Gladys 'as come out of this a proper cow, as could have been told from the first.

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