Crampton Hodnet by Barbara Pym

Author:Barbara Pym [Pym, Barbara]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781844087211
Publisher: Moyer Bell
Published: 1977-01-02T06:00:00+00:00

XIII. Edward and Mother Give a Tea Party

‘Well, Mother, who do you think will be the first to arrive?’ said Edward Killigrew, pacing eagerly about the drawing-room. ‘I think it will be Miss Doggett.’

‘Did you remember to bring the cakes from Boffin’s, dear?’ asked his mother.

‘Oh, Mother, you know I did,’ said Edward, a little impatiently. ‘You can’t ask people to tea and give them nothing to eat.’

‘No,’ said Mrs. Killigrew sardonically, ‘even one’s friends expect more than that. But this afternoon we shall have interesting news for them as well as cakes. That is good.’ She took a little mirror out of her reticule. She was a fine-looking old woman of nearly eighty, very proud of her thick white hair and still good complexion. She was reputed to be of German origin and a slightly guttural quality in her speech sometimes betrayed this, although nobody knew for certain where she had come from. She had somehow always been in Oxford, first as a domineering wife and mother and then as a mother only. She did not entertain very much now but occasionally gave a tea party to which she asked her old friends. ‘I cannot be bothered with young people now,’ she used to say. ‘It gives me more pleasure to see how much older my contemporaries look than I do.’

‘I thought Olive Fremantle was looking very doddery at the Randolph College garden party,’ she said in a satisfied tone. ‘She ought to have let Herbert receive the guests by himself. ‘He is quite capable of it.’

‘The Master of Randolph College and Mrs. Fremantle,’ announced Esther, the stiff, old-fashioned parlourmaid.

‘Dear Charlotte,’ said Olive Fremantle in a quavering voice, ‘you look splendid. I’ve been quite poorly.’ She was a small, insignificant woman, who had always been overshadowed by her husband.

‘I am sorry to hear that,’ said Edward, hovering round with chairs and cushions. ‘It’s not quite so hot today, I think. I always find the heat rather trying myself. Ah, here are Miss Doggett and Miss Morrow. Now we are all here.’

‘Well, Charlotte, you look younger than any of us,’ said Miss Doggett.

‘I expect she’ll see us all in our graves yet,’ said her son jovially. But behind his joviality there lurked a fear that it might be true. Of course Mother was his whole life and he would be quite lost without her, but he occasionally wondered if it might not be rather pleasant to be quite lost.

‘How are you, Miss Morrow?’ asked Mrs. Killigrew graciously. ‘It is many weeks since I have seen you.’

‘I am very well, thank you,’ said Miss Morrow, feeling that she ought to curtsy and say ‘ma’am’. She had been acknowledged now and could sink back into her usual comfortable obscurity. She found a chair, not one into which she could exactly sink back, but a low, curved one covered in tapestry. There was a great deal of tapestry in the room altogether. It would seem that Mrs. Killigrew had spent the greater part of her life in working chair-seats and fire-screens.

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