“Perhaps the best thing would be to have them in in small groups of three or four, one group each week, for tea. If you will give me a list of their names I shall make up the groups, and telephone them as their time comes.”
“I’m afraid they wouldn’t be able to come to tea, Mother,” said Solly; “most of these affairs are rather late in the evening.”
“Oh, I could never manage that; the anxiety of waiting all evening for them to come would be too much for me.”
“Of course it would, Mother. They understand.”
“Oh, so they’ve been discussing it, have they? Well, I don’t want them to understand anything that isn’t so. I am quite capable of offering hospitality on my own terms. When I was a girl and we got up any private theatricals, we usually made rehearsals an excuse for very charming little teas, and sometimes eggnogg parties.”
“I know Mother, but this is different. Much more professional in spirit.”
“Hmph, the world seems to be advancing in everything except amenity.”
“Would you be happy if I invited a few people in, just for a chat in my room, after a rehearsal, now and again? You wouldn’t need to bother with them then.”
“You could hardly invite girls to come here under those circumstances.”
“Of course not. Just a few of the men. And then we should have shown ourselves hospitable, and you wouldn’t have been troubled.”
“Well, perhaps so. I shall write a note to Mrs Forrester, explaining why I have not undertaken to entertain the group as a whole, and then you shall have the men in by twos and threes.”
Mrs Bridgetower wrote the note that same day, and at the next rehearsal Nellie said:
“Oh Solly, how sweet of your mother to write to me like that! I don’t know of anyone else in Salterton who would have done it. Really she’s wonderful! So hospitable, and so gracious. It must be a terrible hardship to her that she can’t entertain as she wants to! Of course we all understand. I’m sending her a little bouquet and a note from me and Val.”
It was not a happy inspiration which persuaded Solly to arrange the first of these masculine gatherings on a night when Miss Cora Fielding was also entertaining the company. The Fieldings were jolly people, and unlike Mrs Bridgetower they really liked to see their children’s friends in their house.
Not only was there chicken and ham and potato salad and olives and anchovies and fruit salad and several sorts of sweetmeats; there was also rather a lot of liquor, and as Mr Fielding was more hospitable than discreet the party, at the end of an hour was lively and noisy. At the end of the second hour, square dances were being performed in a room which was much too small for them, and Valentine had danced a hornpipe with great success. The party broke up at midnight; several people kissed Miss Cora Fielding goodnight, and everybody assured the older Fieldings in merry shouts that they had had a wonderful time.
Solly, who was wondering what he would say to his mother if she happened to be awake, was walking purposefully toward the gate when Humphrey Cobbler hailed him:
“Not so fast, Bridgetower; let us adjourn to your select masculine gathering at a dignified pace.”
“Oh, well, really I hadn’t quite realized that Cora was throwing a party tonight. Must have got my dates mixed. Probably it would be better if you came to me another time.”
“Nonsense. There is no time like the present. Procrastination is a vice I hate. Now, who’s coming with us? Tasset? Hey, Roger Tasset! You’re coming on to Bridgetower’s party aren’t you?”
“Oh yes, I remember now that I said I would,” said Roger, without enthusiasm.
“Who else? Mackilwraith? Ahoy, there, Mackilwraith; come along with us.”
“Isn’t it rather late?” said Hector.
“Not a bit of it. Barely midnight. Come on. We’re going to make the welkin ring at Bridgetower’s.”
“The what ring?” said Hector.
“The welkin. It’s a thing you make ring when you get drunk. Bridgetower has a lovely fresh welkin, just waiting to be rung. Come on!”
The half mile walk to Solly’s home was not enlivened by much conversation. Why, Solly wondered, had he asked this ill-assorted group? Tasset was a man he wanted to know better, for Tasset was plainly attractive to Griselda, and Solly told himself that he wanted to study his rival. Heine, he felt, would have done so. To cast himself in the role of Heine somehow lessened the ignominy of being a rejected lover; he might be nothing to Griselda, but in his Heine role he was certainly an interesting figure to that dim, invisible, but rapt audience which, since his childhood, had watched his every move. Tasset was the crass, successful soldier—the unworthy object upon whom the Adored One chose to squander her affection: he was the scorned, melancholy poet, capable of examining and distilling his emotions even while his heart was wrung.
That explained Tasset most satisfactorily. But why Mackilwraith? Hector plodded at his side in silence, setting down his feet so hard on the pavement that his jowls gave a little quiver at every step. Why, out of all the men in the cast, had he thought of asking this dullard? He raked his mind for a romantic or even for a reasonable explanation, but he could find none.
Cobbler he had asked because he liked him. Cobbler was a man so alive, and so apparently happy, that the air for two or three feet around him seemed charged with his delight in life. But the Cobbler who was so lively a companion by daylight, in the midst of a rehearsal, seemed a little too exuberant, a little too noisy, in the stillness of the night, when one was growing nearer to Mother with every step. He had not the air of a man who would be really considerate about making a noise on the stairs. And the drinks which he had accepted from the hospitable Mr Fielding had made him noisier than usual.
As though to bear out his fears, Cobbler began to dance along the pavement and sing:
“For God’s sake, don’t make such a row,” said Solly. “You’ll wake the whole neighbourhood.”
“I am full of holy joy and free booze,” said Cobbler. “I feel moved to sing. It is very wrong to resist an impulse to sing; to hold back a natural evacuation of joy is as injurious as to hold back any other natural issue. It makes a man spiritually costive, and plugs him up with hard, caked, thwarted merriment. This, in the course of time, poisons his whole system and is likely to turn him into that most detestable of beings, a Dry Wit. God grant that I may never be a Dry Wit. Let me ever be a Wet Wit! Let me pour forth what mirth I have until I am utterly empty—a Nit Wit.” He sang again:
“Please be quiet,” said Solly desperately. “We’re near my home now. My mother is unwell, and she will be asleep.” (Fat chance, he thought, inwardly.) “We’ll go right up to my room; I wouldn’t like to disturb her.”
“Sir, you are talking to a Fellow of the Royal College of Organists,” said Cobbler, with immense solemnity. “You can rely utterly upon my good behaviour. Floreat Diapason!”He began to tiptoe exaggeratedly on the pavement, and turned to whisper Ssh! at Hector, whose feet were making a good deal of noise.