Dorothy Sayers - Gaudy Night

“Though of course,” Harriet reminded herself, “a woman may achieve greatness, or at any rate great renown, by merely being a wonderful wife and mother, like the mother of the Gracchi; whereas the men who have achieved great renown by being devoted husbands and fathers might be counted on the fingers of one hand. Charles I was an unfortunate king, but an admirable family man. Still, you would scarcely class him as one of the world’s great fathers, and his children were not an unqualified success. Dear me! Being a great father is either a very difficult or a very sadly unrewarded profession. Wherever you find a great man, you will find a great mother or a great wife standing behind him-or so they used to say. It would be interesting to know how many great women have had great fathers and husbands behind them. An interesting thesis for research. Elizabeth Barrett? Well, she had a great husband, but he was great in his own right so to speak-and Mr. Barrett was not exactly-The Brontes? Well, hardly. Queen Elizabeth? She had a remarkable father, but devoted helpfulness towards his daughters was scarcely ”is leading characteristic. And she was so wrong-headed as to have no husband-Queen Victoria? You might make a good deal out of poor Albert, but you couldn’t do much with the Duke of Kent.”

Somebody passed through the Hall behind her; it was Miss Hillyard. With mischievous determination to get some response out of this antagonistic personality, Harriet laid before her the new idea for a historical thesis.

“You have forgotten physical achievements,” said Miss Hillyard. “I believe many female singers, dancers, Channel swimmers and tennis stars owe everything to their devoted fathers.”

“But the fathers are not famous.”

“No. Self-effacing men are not popular with either sex. I doubt whether even your literary skill would gain recognition for their virtues. Particularly if you select your women for their intellectual qualities. It will be a short thesis in that case.”

“Gravelled for lack of matter?”

“I’m afraid so. Do you know any man who sincerely admires a woman for her brains?”

“Well,” said Harriet, “certainly not many.”

“You may think you know one,” said Miss Hillyard with a bitter emphasis. “Most of us think at some time or other that we know one. But the man usually has some other little axe to grind.”

“Very likely,” said Harriet. “You don’t seem to have a very high opinion of men-of the male character, I mean, as such.”

“No,” said Miss Hillyard, “not very high. But they have an admirable talent for imposing their point of view on society in general. All women are sensitive to male criticism. Men are not sensitive to female criticism. They despise the critics.”

“Do you, personally, despise male criticism?”

“Heartily, said Miss Hillyard. ”But it does damage. Look at this University. All the men have been amazingly kind and sympathetic about the Women’s Colleges. Certainly. But you won’t find them appointing women to big University posts. That would never do. The women might perform then-work in a way beyond criticism. But they are quite pleased to see us playing with our little toys.”

“Excellent fathers and family men,” murmured Harriet.

“In that sense-yes,” said Miss Hillyard, and laughed rather unpleasantly.

Something funny there, thought Harriet. A personal history, probably. How difficult it was not to be embittered by personal experience. She went down to the J.C.R. and examined herself in the mirror. There had been a look in the History Tutor’s eyes that she did not wish to discover in her own.

Sunday evening prayers. The College was undenominational, but some form of Christian worship was held to be essential to community life. The chapel, with its stained glass windows, plain oak panelling and unadorned Communion Table was a kind of Lowest Common Multiple of all sects and weeds. Harriet, making her way towards it, remembered that she had not seen her gown since the previous afternoon, when the Dean had taken it to the S.C.R. Not liking to penetrate uninvited into that Holy of Holies, she went in search of Miss Martin, who had, it appeared, taken both gowns together to her own room. Harriet wriggled into the gown, one fluttering sleeve of which struck an adjacent table with a loud bang.

“Mercy!” said the Dean, “what’s that?”

“My cigarette-case,” said Harriet. “I thought I’d lost it. I remember now. I hadn’t a pocket yesterday, so I shoved it into the sleeve of my gown. After all, that’s what these sleeves are for, aren’t they?”

“Oh, my dear! Mine are always a perfect dirty-clothes bag by the end of term. When I have absolutely no clean handkerchiefs left in the drawer m scout turns out my gown sleeves. My best collection worked out at twenty two-but then I’d had a bad cold one week. Dreadful insanitary garment. Here’s your cap. Never mind taking your hood-you can come back here for it. What have you been doing today?-I’ve scarcely seen you.”

Again Harriet felt an impulse to mention the unpleasant drawing, but again she refrained. She felt she was getting rather unbalanced about it. Why think about it at all? She mentioned her conversation with Miss Hillyard “Lor‘!” said the Dean. “That’s Miss Hillyard’s hobby-horse. Rubbidge, as Mrs. Gamp would say. Of course men don’t like having their poor little noses put out of joint-who does? I think it’s perfectly noble of them to let us come trampling over their University at all, bless their hearts. They’ve been used to being lords and masters for hundreds of years and they want a bit of time to get used to the change. Why, it takes a man months and months to reconcile himself to a new hat. And just when you’re preparing to send it to the jumble sale, he says. That’s rather a nice hat you’ve got on, where did you get it?’ And you say, ‘My dear Henry, it’s the one I had last year and you said made me look like an organ-grinder’s monkey.’ My brother-in-law says that every time, and it does make my sister so wild.” They mounted the steps of the chapel.

It had not, after all, been so bad. Definitely not so bad as one had expected. Though it was melancholy to find that one had grown out of Mary Stokes, and a little tiresome, in a way, that Mary Stokes refused to recognize the fact. Harriet had long ago discovered that one could not like people any the better, merely because they were ill, or dead-still less because one had once liked them very much. Some happy souls could go through life without making this discovery, and they were the men and women who were called “sincere.” Still, there remained old friends whom one was glad to meet again, like the Dean and Phoebe Tucker. And really, everybody had been quite extraordinarily decent. Rather inquisitive and silly about “the man Wimsey,” some of them, but no doubt with the best intentions. Miss Hillyard might be an exception, but there had always been something a little twisted and uncomfortable about Miss Hillyard.

As the car wound its way over the Chilterns, Harriet grinned to herself, thinking other parting conversation with the Dean and Bursar.

“Be sure and write us a new book soon. And remember, if ever we get a mystery at Shrewsbury we shall call upon you to come and disentangle it.”

“All right,” said Harriet. “When you find a mangled corpse in the buttery, send me a wire‘-and be sure you let Miss Barton view the body, and then she won’t so much mind my haling the murderess off to justice.”

And suppose they actually did find a bloody corpse in the buttery, how surprised they would all be. The glory of a college was that nothing drastic ever happened in it. The most frightful thing that was ever likely to happen was that an undergraduate should “take the wrong turning.” The purloining of a parcel or two by a porter had been enough to throw the whole Senior Common Room into consternation. Bless their hearts, how refreshing and soothing and good they all were, walking beneath their ancient beeches and meditating on ‘όν χαί μή ’όν and the finance of Queen Elizabeth.