she was.’
‘ I suppose it’s just possible that she could be genuinely in love with him —’
‘ Love? That sort of cheap floozie wouldn’t even know the meaning of the word! She’d think it meant having sex three times a day.’
‘ But could Michael perhaps be genuinely in love with her?’
‘ Don’t be idiotic, Charles — how could he be when he’s lived with her long enough to exhaust her very limited possibilities? Now don’t panic — this is what we do: first of all we serve cham pagne and exude charm. Then once the champagne’s disappeared I’ll bear Dinkie off to my sitting-room and — oh good heavens, there goes the doorbell again!’
‘That really must be Malcolm. Shall I —’
‘ Yes, you whisk Malcolm into your study and I’ll tackle the love-birds single-handed. On second thoughts I can probably handle them better if you’re not there.’
We parted, she descending the cellar steps to fetch the cham pagne, I hurrying back across the hall. Once more I flung wide the door to welcome my archdeacon, and once more I found myself receiving a far from pleasant surprise.
My next visitor proved to be Dido Aysgarth, the wife of my enemy, the Dean.
IX
No one knew why Aysgarth, a clergyman riddled with ambition, had jeopardised his career in 1945 in order to marry an eccentric society woman whose one talent was to offend the maximum amount of people in the minimum amount of time at any social gathering burdened by her presence, but Lyle had long since decided that he had been temporarily unhinged by sex. However, I had never been satisfied by this prosaic explanation because I had never been able to regard Dido as sexually attractive. She had a flat chest and legs like matchsticks; it was fortunate that she was now too old to risk following the current fashion of revealing the knees. Her bumpy nose, broken as the result of a hunting accident in her youth, was set in a face where other irregular features con jured up images of nutcrackers and hatchets. But having catalogued her bad points, let me hastily add that she dressed in excellent taste and always looked exceedingly smart. Let me also add, to do her justice, that her brain, although untrained by a formal education in a school, was razor-sharp. Finally I must praise her loyalty to her husband and admire the fact that even in the most adverse circumstances her devotion to him had never wavered.
‘ Charles my dear!’ she exclaimed, sweeping over the threshold before I could even open my mouth to invite her in. ‘Do forgive me for dropping in on you without warning, but as soon as I heard the ghastly news about Desmond Wilton — that peculiar woman Miss Baines phoned me to say she found the body — well, no, to be strictly accurate I must confess it was Tommy Fitzgerald she phoned — you know she’s his charlady — but I happened to be calling on Tommy at the time to discuss the arrangements for feeding the visiting choir after the St Matthew Passion, and as he was making tea when the phone rang I answered it — the phone, I mean — and of course Miss Baines recognised my voice because I sorted out her varicose veins with the hospital after they tried to tell her there was a two-year waiting list —’
‘Come into the study, Dido. Can I offer you a drink?’
‘ No, no, quite unnecessary, thank you — was that Michael’s car I saw parked in the drive?’
‘Well, as a matter of fact —’
‘ I can’t imagine why young men like sports cars, so draughty in winter, but Michael’s only twenty-four, isn’t he — or is it twenty-five? — and still has quite a lot of growing up to do, I daresay, particularly in regard to women — and quite frankly, Charles, if I may be absolutely candid — and as you know, I’m famed for my candour — if one of my stepsons was mixed up with a foreign drug-addict I’d put my foot down in the firmest possible way — but of course you’re trying to be Christian,
‘ I suppose it’s just possible that she could be genuinely in love with him —’
‘ Love? That sort of cheap floozie wouldn’t even know the meaning of the word! She’d think it meant having sex three times a day.’
‘ But could Michael perhaps be genuinely in love with her?’
‘ Don’t be idiotic, Charles — how could he be when he’s lived with her long enough to exhaust her very limited possibilities? Now don’t panic — this is what we do: first of all we serve cham pagne and exude charm. Then once the champagne’s disappeared I’ll bear Dinkie off to my sitting-room and — oh good heavens, there goes the doorbell again!’
‘That really must be Malcolm. Shall I —’
‘ Yes, you whisk Malcolm into your study and I’ll tackle the love-birds single-handed. On second thoughts I can probably handle them better if you’re not there.’
We parted, she descending the cellar steps to fetch the cham pagne, I hurrying back across the hall. Once more I flung wide the door to welcome my archdeacon, and once more I found myself receiving a far from pleasant surprise.
My next visitor proved to be Dido Aysgarth, the wife of my enemy, the Dean.
IX
No one knew why Aysgarth, a clergyman riddled with ambition, had jeopardised his career in 1945 in order to marry an eccentric society woman whose one talent was to offend the maximum amount of people in the minimum amount of time at any social gathering burdened by her presence, but Lyle had long since decided that he had been temporarily unhinged by sex. However, I had never been satisfied by this prosaic explanation because I had never been able to regard Dido as sexually attractive. She had a flat chest and legs like matchsticks; it was fortunate that she was now too old to risk following the current fashion of revealing the knees. Her bumpy nose, broken as the result of a hunting accident in her youth, was set in a face where other irregular features con jured up images of nutcrackers and hatchets. But having catalogued her bad points, let me hastily add that she dressed in excellent taste and always looked exceedingly smart. Let me also add, to do her justice, that her brain, although untrained by a formal education in a school, was razor-sharp. Finally I must praise her loyalty to her husband and admire the fact that even in the most adverse circumstances her devotion to him had never wavered.
‘ Charles my dear!’ she exclaimed, sweeping over the threshold before I could even open my mouth to invite her in. ‘Do forgive me for dropping in on you without warning, but as soon as I heard the ghastly news about Desmond Wilton — that peculiar woman Miss Baines phoned me to say she found the body — well, no, to be strictly accurate I must confess it was Tommy Fitzgerald she phoned — you know she’s his charlady — but I happened to be calling on Tommy at the time to discuss the arrangements for feeding the visiting choir after the St Matthew Passion, and as he was making tea when the phone rang I answered it — the phone, I mean — and of course Miss Baines recognised my voice because I sorted out her varicose veins with the hospital after they tried to tell her there was a two-year waiting list —’
‘Come into the study, Dido. Can I offer you a drink?’
‘ No, no, quite unnecessary, thank you — was that Michael’s car I saw parked in the drive?’
‘Well, as a matter of fact —’
‘ I can’t imagine why young men like sports cars, so draughty in winter, but Michael’s only twenty-four, isn’t he — or is it twenty-five? — and still has quite a lot of growing up to do, I daresay, particularly in regard to women — and quite frankly, Charles, if I may be absolutely candid — and as you know, I’m famed for my candour — if one of my stepsons was mixed up with a foreign drug-addict I’d put my foot down in the firmest possible way — but of course you’re trying to be Christian,
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