Highland Fling (6 page)

At the present moment Jane was undergoing the usual preliminary phase with regard to Albert. She had met him several times in London and thought him easily the most attractive person of her acquaintance. As she gazed out of the corridor window it occurred to her that here, most probably, was the genius for whom she had been searching for such a long time; her brain circled, as it were, round and round the subject, but she sought no conclusion and arrived at none. Presently the long thin woman passed by on her way to the first-class sleepers, followed by her husband. In motion she looked more than ever like a horse.

Jane climbed into her sleeper and lay down. She was sharing the carriage with three other women, all, luckily, unknown to each other, so there was no conversation. They looked at her with some disapproval as, contrary to third-class convention, she undressed completely and put on a pair of pyjamas. She greased her face, brushed her hair and settled down for a horrible night of banging, jolting and waking up at countless stations. All the time she half thought, half dreamed of Albert, wondering if he would have arrived yet at Dalloch Castle, how long he intended to stay, and whether he was at all excited at the prospect of their meeting. Towards the morning she fell into a profound sleep.

When she woke up the train was passing through Highland scenery. Purple hills kept rising outside the carriage window and obscuring the sky. They were covered with little streams and sheep. Everything was very quiet, even the train seemed to make less noise than it had done the previous evening; the air had a peculiar quality of extreme clearness like cold water.

Jane felt, but quickly checked, a romantic tremor. She removed her gaze from the moors and began to dress. The other women were still asleep, looking like modern German pictures.

At Inverness, Jane had to change into a local train, which
ambled for about an hour in rather an intimate sort of way over moors and through pine woods, stopping here and there at little toy stations. When she alighted at Dalloch Station she noticed the long thin woman of the previous night standing by the guard’s van with her husband, and presumed that they must be going to the castle. Sure enough, when they had collected their luggage, which took some time because there was a great deal of it as well as two spaniels, they climbed into the motor-car where Jane was already installed and introduced themselves as the Chadlingtons. She gathered from labels on their hand luggage that they were Captain and Lady Brenda Chadlington, a name she seemed vaguely to know.

‘Have you stayed at Dalloch before?’ asked Lady Brenda as they drove out of the station yard.

‘No; you see, I don’t know the Craigdallochs. Sally Monteath asked me. Have you been here before?’

‘Oh, yes! Every year since I can remember. Madge Craigdalloch is my mother’s greatest friend and my godmother. I can’t imagine what it will be like without her and Craig, although I’m told the Monteaths are charming. What bad luck for poor Craig having to go off like that, wasn’t it …?’

She rambled on in the bored, uninterested voice of one who has been taught to think that any conversation is better than none. Her husband looked out of the window in silence.

Sally greeted them in the hall of Dalloch Castle on their arrival. She was looking lovelier than usual in a pair of pink satin pyjamas.

‘Please excuse these clothes. I’ve just this moment woken up. We only got here last night after a most fiendish journey in the car. How tired you must all be. I’ve had hot-water bottles put in your beds and breakfast will be sent up at once. Shall we go upstairs?’

The Chadlingtons glanced at each other in a startled kind of way.

General Murgatroyd now appeared and was introduced to Jane. He evidently knew the Chadlingtons very well and offered to show them their rooms, while Sally, relieved to have got rid of them, carried off Jane to have breakfast with herself and Walter, who was still in bed.

‘Let’s fetch old Gates,’ said Walter, ‘and have a party in here.’

Sally turned on the gramophone while he went along the passage, soon to return with Albert, who looked sleepy but cheerful in a pair of orange pyjamas. Jane thought him more attractive even than in London.

Presently trays of delicious breakfast appeared and they all sat on the bed munching happily, except Albert who announced that he was unable to touch food in the morning and asked the slightly astonished housemaid for a glass of maraschino.

Jane asked if he had also travelled up in the Craigdallochs’ car.

‘Indeed, yes,’ he replied. ‘What a journey, too; all through England’s green unpleasant land, as Blake so truly calls it. My
one happy moment was at Carlisle, where we spent a night. When I opened what I supposed to be a cupboard door in my room, I was greeted by inky blackness, through which was just visible a pile of sordid clothes and cries of: “Well, I’m damned!” and “What impertinence!” It was a conjugal bedroom!’

Jane laughed.

‘I expect if you knew the truth it was no such thing.’

‘Well, I thought of that myself, but came to the conclusion that people who were indulging in a little enjoyable sin would probably be in better tempers. They actually rang the bell and said very loudly to the maid so that I couldn’t fail to hear: “The person next door
keeps
coming in. Will you please lock it on this side so that we can have some peace?”
Keeps coming in
, indeed, as though I wanted to know the details of their squalid
ménage
. However, I had my revenge. I cleaned my teeth very loudly every half-hour all through the night. It woke them up each time, too! I could hear them grumbling.’

‘Has all the rest of the party arrived?’ asked Jane.

‘All except Lord and Lady Prague. The general, whom you saw downstairs, Admiral Wenceslaus and Mr Buggins were all here last night,’ said Walter. ‘We had about half an hour’s conversation with them before going to bed. Mr Buggins seems rather nice and Sally has quite fallen for the admiral.’

‘As I have for the general,’ remarked Albert; ‘but then I have always had a great
penchant
for soldiers. It fascinates me to think how brave they must be. Sometimes one sees them marching about in London, all looking so wonderfully brave. I admire that. Sailors, too, must be very courageous, but somehow one doesn’t feel it in quite the same way. Perhaps the fact that they are clean-shaven makes them more akin to oneself. This particular admiral certainly fixed upon me an extremely fierce and penetrating eye; instinctively I thought here is the hero of many an ocean fight, a rare old sea-dog.’

‘His eye,’ said Walter, ‘is glass. At least, one of them is. I don’t want to disillusion you, Albert dear.’

‘How fascinating!’ cried Albert. ‘I knew the moment I saw him that the admiral was not quite as we are. This accounts for it. How d’you think he lost it, Walter? I suppose it hardly could have been plucked out by pirates or the Inquisition? Do you think he is sensitive about it? Will he, for instance, mind if he sees me looking closely at him to discover which eye is which? I must find out how he lost it. I suppose it would be tactless to ask him right out? But the general may know. I don’t despair. Or Mr Buggins. I like Mr Buggins. He appears to be a man of some culture. He saw my picture “Tape Measures” reproduced in the
Studio
and was kind enough to mention it appreciatively.

‘Now, my dears, I am going to dress, as I can hardly wait to begin exploring this house, which promises, in my opinion, to be very rewarding to the intelligent student of the nineteenth century. What do you intend to put on, Walter? I fear I have no tweeds, so shall be obliged to wear some trousers and a jersey. Will that be suitable, do you think?’

He picked up his black taffeta wrap and left the room.

Meanwhile, General Murgatroyd escorted the Chadlingtons to the dining-room where they made a hearty breakfast of sausages, eggs, ham and strong tea. The general, who some two hours since had eaten enough for three, kept them company with a plate of brawn. They all spoke in monosyllables, their mouths full.

‘Bad luck for poor old Craig.’

‘Oh, rotten.’

‘When did the Monteaths get here?’

‘Last night – late.’

‘Anybody else?’

‘Stanislas is here and Buggins.’

‘Anybody else?’

‘Yes; namby-pamby chap called Gates – artist or something. Came with the Monteaths.’

‘Who’s to come?’

‘Only Floss and Prague. Coming tonight.’

‘Does Monteath shoot?’

‘No, nor Gates. Just as well, from the look of them.’

‘What’s Mrs Monteath like?’

‘Oh, all right. Better than the others, I should say.’

‘Pretty, isn’t she?’

‘Too much dolled up for me, otherwise quite handsome.’

‘Finished your breakfast?’

‘M’m!’

‘Come and look at the river, then.’

‘Wait a moment. We’ll get our rods put up.’

‘Not much use, too bright.’

‘Oh, we might as well have a try, all the same.’

About two hours later, Jane, having bathed and changed out of her travelling clothes, wandered downstairs, where she came upon Albert, exquisitely dressed in bright blue trousers and a black sweater. He was roaming about, notebook in hand.

‘My dear Jane,’ he said, ‘this house is unique. I am in ecstasies. Most of it seems scarcely to have been touched for the last fifty years. Nevertheless, we are only just in time. The hand of the modern decorator is already upon it. The drawing-room, alas! I find utterly ruined. Our absent hostess would appear to have that Heal
cum
Lenigen complex so prevalent among the British aristocracy. Happily, in this case, it has been muzzled, presumably by lack of funds, but its influence is creeping over the whole house. The oak, for instance, on these stairs and in the entrance hall has been pickled – a modern habit, which one cannot too heartily deplore – and much exquisite furniture has been banished to the servants’ hall, some
even to the attics. On the other hand, the boudoir, stone hall, billiard- and dining-rooms appear to be quite unspoilt. Come with me, my dear.’

Albert led the way to the dining-room, where the table was being laid for luncheon. It was a huge room with dark red brocade walls and a pale blue-and-yellow ceiling covered in real gold stars. At one end there arose an enormous Gothic mantelpiece of pitch-pine. Several Raeburns and two Winterhalters adorned the walls.

‘Winterhalter,’ murmured Albert, ‘my favourite artist. I must call your attention to this clock, made of the very cannonball which rolled to the feet of Ernest, 4th Earl of Craigdalloch during the Battle of Inkerman. Shall we go and look at the outside of the castle? We have just time before lunch.’

They went into the garden and walked round the house, which was built in the Victorian feudal style, and rather resembled a large white cake with windows and battlements picked out in chocolate icing. Albert was thrown into raptures by its appearance.

When they returned to the front door they found Walter and the general standing on the steps.

‘Ah! this house! this house!’ cried Albert. ‘I am enchanted by it. Good morning, General.’

‘Good morning, Gates.’

‘Walter, have you ever seen such a house? General, you agree, I hope, that it is truly exquisite?’

‘Yes; I’m attached to the place myself. Been here, man and boy, for the last fifty years or so. Best grouse moor in the country, you know, and as good fishing as you can find between here and the Dee, I swear it is.’

‘It
is
lovely,’ said Jane doubtfully. ‘I wonder what we shall do all day though.’

‘Do? Why, my dear young lady, by the time you’ve been out with the guns, or flogging the river all day, you’ll be too tired to
do anything except perhaps to have a set or two of lawn tennis. After dinner we can always listen to Craig’s wireless. I’ve just asked the chauffeur to fix it up.’

‘I personally shall be busy taking photographs,’ said Albert. ‘I am shortly bringing out a small brochure on the minor arts of the nineteenth century, and although I had already collected much material for it, there are in this house some objects so unique that I shall have to make a most careful revision of my little work. I also feel it is my duty to the nation to compile a catalogue of what I find here. You write, General?’

‘I once wrote a series of articles for
Country Life
on stable bedding.’

‘But how macabre! Then you, I and Walter, all three, belong to the fellowship of the pen; but while you and I are in a way but tyros, I feeling frankly more at home with a paintbrush and you, most probably, with a fox’s brush, Walter here is one of our latter day immortals.’

And he began to recite in a loud voice one of his friend’s poems:

Walter blushed.

‘
Please
, Albert.’

‘My dear Walter, that is good. It is more than good – it has an enduring quality and I think will live. Do you not agree, general? You and I, Walter, will do a great deal of work here. I
have found a room with a large green table in the centre very well lighted. It will be ideal for my purpose. Then I am hoping that Sally will perhaps give me a few sittings. Do you think that she might be persuaded?’

‘My dear, she’d adore to. Sally very much believes in having herself reproduced in all mediums. Come on. There’s the gong for lunch.’

By dinner-time that evening the whole party was assembled, Lord and Lady Prague having arrived in a motor-car soon after seven o’clock.

Sally had spent much time and thought over the arrangement of the table, feeling that it was her duty to try and make the first evening a success, and as she sat down she thought, with some satisfaction, that she had mixed up the party rather well. It soon became apparent, however, that the party was not mixing. Her own task, seated between Lord Prague and Captain Chadlington, might well have daunted a far more experienced conversationalist, the former being stone deaf and moreover thoroughly engrossed in the pleasures of the table, while the latter appeared to possess a vocabulary of exactly three words – ‘I say!’ and ‘No!’ – which he used alternately. She fought a losing battle valiantly, remembering that the really important thing on these occasions is to avoid an oasis of silence. Walter declared afterwards that he distinctly heard her ask Lord Prague if he belonged to the London Group, and that, on receiving no answer, she then proceeded to recite
Lycidas
to him until the end of dinner.