A Dance to the Music of Time: 1st Movement

  After a quarter of an hour the balls no longer reappeared for play, vanishing one by one, while scores were doubled. Foppa approved of Jean. Her skill at billiards was a perpetual surprise and delight to him.

  ‘He probably tells all his friends I’m his mistress,’ she used to say.

  She may have been right in supposing that; though I suspect, if he told any such stories, that Foppa would probably have boasted of some enormous lady, at least twice his own size, conceived in the manner of Jordaens. His turn of humour always suggested something of that sort.

  I thought the club might be a good place to recover some sort of composure. The room was never very full, though sometimes there would be a party of three or four playing cards gravely at one of the tables in the corner. On that particular evening Foppa himself was engrossed in a two-handed game, perhaps piquet. Sitting opposite him, his back to the room, was a man of whom nothing could be seen but a brown check suit and a smoothly brushed head, greying and a trifle bald at the crown. Foppa rose at once, poured out Chianti for us, and shouted down the service hatch for sandwiches to be cut. Although the cook was believed to be a Cypriot, the traditional phrase for attracting his attention was always formulated in French.

  ‘Là bas!’ Foppa would intone liturgically, as he leant forward into the abyss that reached down towards the kitchen, ‘Là bas!’

  Perhaps Miss Foppa herself attended to the provision of food in the evenings. If so, she never appeared in the club. Her quiet, melancholy beauty would have ornamented the place. I had, indeed, never seen any woman but Jean in that room. No doubt the clientèle would have objected to the presence there of any lady not entirely removed from their own daily life.

  Two Soho Italians were standing by the bar. One, a tall, sallow, mournful character, resembling a former ambassador fallen on evil days, smoked a short, stinking cigar. The other, a nondescript ruffian, smaller in size than his companion, though also with a certain air of authority, displayed a suggestion of side-whisker under his faun velour hat. He was picking his teeth pensively with one of the toothpicks supplied in tissue paper at the bar. Both were probably neighbouring head-waiters. The two of them watched Jean slide the cue gently between finger and thumb before making her first shot. The ambassadorial one removed the cigar from his mouth and, turning his head a fraction, remarked sententiously through almost closed lips:

  ‘Bella posizione.’

  ‘E in gamba,’ agreed the other. ‘Una fuori classe davvero.’

  The evening was happier now, though still something might easily go wrong. There was no certainty. People are differently equipped for withstanding emotional discomfort. On the whole women can bear a good deal of that kind of strain without apparently undue inconvenience. The game was won by Jean.

  ‘What about another one?’

  We asked the Italians if they were waiting for the billiard table, but they did not want to play. We had just arranged the balls again, and set up the pin, when the door of the club opened and two people came into the room. One of them was Barnby. The girl with him was known to me, though it was a second before I remembered that she was Lady Anne Stepney. We had not met for three years or more. Barnby seemed surprised, perhaps not altogether pleased, to find someone he knew at Foppa’s.

  Although it had turned out that Anne Stepney was the girl he had met on the train after his week-end with the Manasches, he had ceased to speak of her freely in conversation. At the same time I knew he was still seeing her. This was on account of a casual word dropped by him. I had never before run across them together in public. Some weeks after his first mention of her, I had asked whether he had finally established her identity. Barnby had replied brusquely:

  ‘Of course her name is Stepney.’

  I sometimes wondered how the two of them were getting along; even whether they had plans for marriage. A year was a long time for Barnby to be occupied with one woman. Like most men of his temperament, he held, on the whole, rather strict views regarding other people’s morals. For that reason alone he would probably not have approved had I told him about Jean. In any case he was not greatly interested in such things unless himself involved. He only knew that something of the sort was in progress, and he would have had no desire, could it have been avoided, to come upon us unexpectedly in this manner.

  The only change in Anne Stepney (last seen at Stringham’s wedding) was her adoption of a style of dress implicitly suggesting an art student; nothing outrageous: just a general assertion that she was in some way closely connected with painting or sculpture. I think Mona had struggled against such an appearance; in Anne Stepney, it had no doubt been painfully acquired. Clothes of that sort certainly suited her large dark eyes and reddish hair, seeming also appropriate to a general air of untidiness, not to say grubbiness, that always possessed her. She had by then, I knew, passed almost completely from the world in which she had been brought up; that in which her sister, Peggy, still moved, or, at least, in that portion of it frequented by young married women.

  The Bridgnorths had taken their younger daughter’s behaviour philosophically. They had gone through all the normal processes of giving her a start in life, a ball for her ‘coming out’, and everything else to be reasonably expected of parents in the circumstances. In the end they had agreed that ‘in these days’ it was impossible to insist on the hopes or standards of their own generation. Anne had been allowed to go her own way, while Lady Bridgnorth had returned to her hospital committees, Lord Bridgnorth to his politics and racing. They had probably contented themselves with the thought that Peggy, having quietly divorced Stringham, had now settled down peacefully enough with her new husband in his haunted, Palladian Yorkshire home, which was said to have given St. John Clarke the background for a novel. Besides, their eldest son, Mountfichet, I had been told, was turning out well at the university, where he was a great favourite with Sillery.

  When introductions took place, it seemed simpler to make no reference to the fact that we had met before. Anne Stepney stared round the room with severe approval. Indicating Foppa and his companion, she remarked:

  ‘I always think people playing cards make such a good pattern.’

  ‘Rather like a Chardin,’ I suggested.

  ‘Do you think so?’ she replied, implying contradiction rather than agreement.

  ‘The composition?’

  ‘You know I am really only interested in Chardin’s highlights,’ she said.

  Before we could pursue the intricacies of Chardin’s technique further, Foppa rose to supply further drinks. He had already made a sign of apology at his delay in doing this, to be accounted for by the fact that his game was on the point of completion when Barnby arrived. He now noted the score on a piece of paper and came towards us. He was followed this time to the bar by the man with whom he had been at cards. Foppa’s companion could now be seen more clearly. His suit was better cut and general appearance more distinguished than was usual in the club. He had stood by the table for a moment, stretching himself and lighting a cigarette, while he regarded our group. A moment later, taking a step towards Anne Stepney, he said in a soft, purring, rather humorous voice, with something almost hypnotic about its tone:

  ‘I heard your name when you were introduced. You must be Eddie Bridgnorth’s daughter.’

  Looking at him more closely as he said this, I was surprised that he had remained almost unobserved until that moment. He was no ordinary person. That was clear. Of medium height, even rather small when not compared with Foppa, he was slim, with that indefinably ‘horsey’ look that seems even to affect the texture of the skin. His age was hard to guess: probably he was in his forties. He was very trim in his clothes. They were old, neat, well preserved clothes, a little like those worn by Uncle Giles. This man gave the impression of having handled large sums of money in his time, although he did not convey any presumption of affluence at that particular moment. He was clean-shaven, and wore a hard collar and Brigade of Guards tie. I could not imagine what some
one of that sort was doing at Foppa’s. There was something about him of Buster Foxe, third husband of Stringham’s mother: the same cool, tough, socially elegant personality, though far more genial than Buster’s. He lacked, too, that carapace of professional egotism acquired in boyhood that envelops protectively even the most good-humoured naval officer. Perhaps the similarity to Buster was after all only the outer veneer acquired by all people of the same generation.

  Anne Stepney replied rather stiffly to this enquiry, that ‘Eddie Bridgnorth’ was indeed her father. Having decided to throw in her lot so uncompromisingly with ‘artists’, she may have felt put out to find herself confronted in such a place by someone of this kind. Since he claimed acquaintance with Lord Bridgnorth, there was no knowing what information he might possess about herself; nor what he might report subsequently if he saw her father again. However, the man in the Guards tie seemed instinctively to understand what her feelings would be on learning that he knew her family.

  ‘I am Dicky Umfraville,’ he said. ‘I don’t expect you have ever heard of me, because I have been away from this country for so long. I used to see something of your father when he owned Yellow Jack. In fact I won a whole heap of money on that horse once. None of it left now, I regret to say.’

  He smiled gently. By the confidence, and at the same time the modesty, of his manner he managed to impart an extraordinary sense of reassurance. Anne Stepney seemed hardly to know what to say in answer to this account of himself. I remembered hearing Sillery speak of Umfraville, when I was an undergraduate. Perhaps facetiously, he had told Stringham that Umfraville was a man to beware of. That had been apropos of Stringham’s father, and life in Kenya. Stringham himself had met Umfraville in Kenya, and spoke of him as a well-known gentleman-rider. I also remembered Stringham complaining that Le Bas had once mistaken him for Umfraville, who had been at Le Bas’s house at least fifteen years earlier. Now, in spite of the difference in age and appearance, I could see that Le Bas’s error had been due to something more than the habitual vagueness of schoolmasters. The similarity between Stringham and Umfraville was of a moral rather than physical sort. The same dissatisfaction with life and basic melancholy gave a resemblance, though Umfraville’s features and expression were more formalised and, in some manner, coarser—perhaps they could even be called more brutal—than Stringham’s.

  There was something else about Umfraville that struck me, a characteristic I had noticed in other people of his age. He seemed still young, a person like oneself; and yet at the same time his appearance and manner proclaimed that he had had time to live at least a few years of his grown-up life before the outbreak of war in 1914. Once I had thought of those who had known the epoch of my own childhood as ‘older people’. Then I had found there existed people like Umfraville who seemed somehow to span the gap. They partook of both eras, specially forming the tone of the postwar years; much more so, indeed, than the younger people. Most of them, like Umfraville, were melancholy; perhaps from the strain of living simultaneously in two different historical periods. That was his category, certainly. He continued now to address himself to Anne Stepney.

  ‘Do you ever go to trotting races?’

  ‘No.’

  She looked very surprised at the question.

  ‘I thought not,’ he said, laughing at her astonishment. ‘I became interested when I was in the States. The Yanks are very keen on trotting races. So are the French. In this country no one much ever seems to go. However, I met Foppa, here, down at Greenford the other day and we got on so well that we arranged to go to Caversham together. The next thing is I find myself playing piquet with him in his own joint.’

  Foppa laughed at this account of the birth of their friendship, and rubbed his hands together.

  ‘You had all the luck tonight, Mr. Umfraville,’ he said. ‘Next time I have my revenge.’

  ‘Certainly, Foppa, certainly.’

  However, in spite of the way the cards had fallen, Foppa seemed pleased to have Umfraville in the club. Later, I found that one of Umfraville’s most fortunate gifts was a capacity to take money off people without causing offence.

  A moment or two of general conversation followed in which it turned out that Jean had met Barnby on one of his visits to Stourwater. She knew, of course, about his former connection with Baby Wentworth, but when we had talked of this together, she had been uncertain whether or not they had ever stayed with Sir Magnus Donners at the same time. They began to discuss the week-end during which both had been in the same large house-party. Anne Stepney, possibly to avoid a further immediate impact with Umfraville before deciding how best to treat him, crossed the room to examine Victor Emmanuel’s picture. Umfraville and I were, accordingly, left together. I asked if he remembered Stringham in Kenya.

  ‘Charles Stringham?’ he said. ‘Yes, of course I knew him. Boffles Stringham’s son. A very nice boy. But wasn’t he married to her sister?’

  He lowered his voice, and jerked his head in Anne’s direction.

  ‘They are divorced now.’

  ‘Of course they are. I forgot. As a matter of fact I heard Charles was in rather a bad way. Drinking enough to float a battleship. Of course, Boffles likes his liquor hard, too. Have you known Charles long?’

  ‘We were at the same house at school—Le Bas’s.’

  ‘Not possible.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because I was at Le Bas’s too. Not for very long. I started at Corderey’s. Then Corderey’s house was taken over by Le Bas. I was asked to leave quite soon after that—not actually sacked, as is sometimes maliciously stated by my friends. I get invited to Old Boy dinners, for example. Not that I ever go. Usually out of England. As a matter of fact I might go this year. What about you?’

  ‘I might. I haven’t been myself for a year or two.’

  ‘Do come. We’ll make up a party and raise hell. Tear Claridge’s in half. That’s where they hold it, isn’t it?’

  ‘Or the Ritz.’

  ‘You must come.’

  There was a suggestion of madness in the way he shot out his sentences; not the kind of madness that was raving, nor even, in the ordinary sense, dangerous; but a warning that no proper mechanism existed for operating normal controls. At the same time there was also something impelling about his friendliness: this sudden decision that we must attend the Old Boy dinner together. Even though I knew fairly well—at least flattered myself I knew well—the type of man he was, I could not help being pleased by the invitation. Certainly, I made up my mind immediately that I would go to the Le Bas dinner, upon which I was far from decided before. In fact, it would be true to say that Umfraville had completely won me over; no doubt by the shock tactics against which Sillery had issued his original warning. In such matters, though he might often talk nonsense, Sillery possessed a strong foundation of shrewdness. People who disregarded his admonitions sometimes lived to regret it.

  ‘Do you often come here?’ Umfraville asked.

  ‘Once in a way—to play Russian billiards.’

  ‘Tell me the name of that other charming girl.’

  ‘Jean Duport.’

  ‘Anything to do with the fellow who keeps company with Bijou Ardglass?’

  ‘Wife.’

  ‘Dear me. How eccentric of him with something so nice at home. Anne, over there, is a dear little thing, too. Bit of a handful, I hear. Fancy her being grown up. Only seems the other day I read the announcement of her birth. Wouldn’t mind taking her out to dinner one day, if I had the price of a dinner on me.’

  ‘Do you live permanently in Kenya?’

  ‘Did for a time. Got rather tired of it lately. Isn’t what it was in the early days. But, you know, something seems to have gone badly wrong with this country too. It’s quite different from when I was over here two or three years ago. Then there was a party every night—two or three, as a matter of fact. Now all that is changed. No parties, no gaiety, everyone talking in a dreadfully serious manner about economics or world disarmam
ent or something of the sort. That was why I was glad to come here and take a hand with Foppa. No nonsense about economics or world disarmament with him. All the people I know have become so damned serious, what? Don’t you find that yourself?’

  ‘It’s the slump.’

  Umfraville’s face had taken on a strained, worried expression while he was saying this, almost the countenance of a priest preaching a gospel of pleasure to a congregation now fallen away from the high standards of the past. There was a look of hopelessness in his eyes, as if he knew of the terrible odds against him, the martyrdom that would be his final crown. At that moment he again reminded me, for some reason, of Buster Foxe. I had never heard Buster express such opinions, though in general they were at that time voiced commonly enough.

  ‘Anyway, it’s nice to find all of you here,’ he said. ‘Let’s have another drink.’

  Barnby and Anne Stepney now began to play billiards together. They seemed not on the best of terms, and had perhaps had some sort of a quarrel earlier in the evening. If Mrs. Erdleigh had been able to examine the astrological potentialities of that day she would perhaps have warned groups of lovers that the aspects were ominous. Jean came across to the bar. She took my arm, as if she wished to emphasise to Umfraville that we were on the closest terms. This was in spite of the fact that she herself was always advocating discretion. All the same, I felt delighted and warmed by her touch. Umfraville smiled, almost paternally, as if he felt that here at least he could detect on our part some hope of a pursuit of pleasure. He showed no disposition to return to his game with Foppa, now chatting with the two Italians.

  ‘Charles Stringham was mixed up with Milly Andriadis at one moment, wasn’t he?’ Umfraville asked.

  ‘About three years ago—just before his marriage.’

  ‘I think it was just starting when I was last in London. Don’t expect that really did him any good. Milly has got a way of exhausting chaps, no matter who they are. Even her Crowned Heads. They can’t stand it after a bit. I remember one friend of mine had to take a voyage round the world to recover. He got D.T.s in Hongkong. Thought he was being hunted by naked women riding on unicorns. What’s happened to Milly now?’