Susan Howatch - Scandalous Risks

‘Well, yes, I do know Christian and Katie, but –’

‘Splendid! They’re your passport to your new life. Don’t linger in dull old Starbridge. Seek that room you want in Oxford and wangle your way into Christian’s set.’

‘But Christian just sees me as one of Primrose’s gang of virgin spinsters!’

‘He won’t when you arrive in Oxford flaunting glamorous eye make-up and Pre-Raphaelite hair. I think that you and Primrose,’ said Mrs Ashworth, careful in her choice of words, ‘may have reached the parting of the ways.’ Before I could comment she was adding with regret: ‘I wish I could invite you to stay tonight, but thanks to Nicholas and our visiting American bishop, we’ve got a full house.’

I said with curiosity: ‘What’s Nick’s connection with your family?’

‘His father and Charles have known each other for many years, and since Jon Darrow’s now very old Charles likes to keep a paternal eye on Nicholas to make sure he’s all right.’

‘Isn’t there a mother?’

‘She died. There’s a half-brother in London –’

‘The actor.’

‘That’s right – and there was a half-sister, but she’s dead now too and Nicholas never had much in common with her children.’

‘He’s very …’ I tried to find the right word but could only produce a banality ‘… unusual.’

‘Yes, isn’t he? Sometimes I think he needs a substitute mother, but I never feel my maternal instinct can stretch far enough to take him on – although I must say, my maternal instinct seems to have stretched out of sight during this conversation! I seem to have forgotten I’m a bishop’s wife. Instead of advising you to vamp the intellectuals of Oxford I should be telling you to get a job at the diocesan office and help me with my charity work in your spare time!’

I laughed but before I could reply the front door banged far away in the hall. ‘That’ll be either Charles or our American bishop,’ said Mrs Ashworth, rising to her feet, ‘and let’s hope it’s Charles. I do like Americans, but all that sunny-natured purring’s so exhausting.’

‘Darling!’ shouted the Bishop downstairs.

‘Coo-ee!’ called Mrs Ashworth with relief, and added indulgently to me: ‘Isn’t he funny? He so often arrives home and shouts: “Darling!” like that. It’s as if he has no idea what to do next and is waiting for instructions.’

In walked the Bishop, looking like a film star in a costume melodrama. The old episcopal uniform of apron, gaiters and frock-coat, so suitable for the eighteenth-century bishops who had had to ride around their dioceses on horseback, was finally giving way to more modern attire, but for his official engagement that afternoon Dr Ashworth had decided to be conservative, and he looked well in his swashbuckling uniform. He was two years older than Aysgarth, but like his wife he appeared younger – not much younger, perhaps, but he could still have passed for a man on the right side of sixty.

‘How are your parents?’ he said to me agreeably after the greetings had been exchanged.

‘Seething. I’ve just left home and embarked on a new life.’

He gave me his charming smile but it failed to reach the corners of his eyes. Perhaps he was trying to decide whether I could be classified as ‘wayward’ or ‘lost’ or even ‘fallen’. Smoothly he fell back on his erudition. ‘This sounds like a case of metanoia !’ he remarked. ‘By which I mean –’

‘I know what it means. The Dean told me. It’s a turning away from one’s old life and the beginning of a new one.’

‘In Christ,’ said the Bishop casually, as if correcting an undergraduate who had made an error in a tutorial. ‘I hope the Dean didn’t forget to mention Christ, but these liberal-radicals nowadays seem to be capable of anything.’ He turned to his wife and added: ‘I lost count of the times I was asked about Honest to God this afternoon. People were deeply upset. It’s a pity Robinson wasn’t there to see the results of his ill-informed, half-baked radicalism.’

‘I thought Robinson was supposed to be a conservative,’ I said. ‘After all, he wasn’t invited to contribute to Soundings , was he?’

The Bishop looked startled. ‘Who’s been talking to you of Soundings ?’

‘The Dean was very enthusiastic when the book was published.’

‘I’d have more confidence in Stephen’s bold espousal of the views contained in these controversial books if I knew he was a trained theologian,’ said Dr Ashworth. ‘However, as we all know, he read Greats, not Theology, when he was up at Oxford.’

‘But since he’s been a clergyman for almost forty years,’ I said, ‘don’t you think he might have picked up a little theology somewhere along the way?’

The Bishop was clearly not accustomed to being answered back by a young female who had never even been to a university. Possibly he was unaccustomed to being answered back by anyone. He took a moment to recover from the shock but then said suavely enough: ‘Good point! But perhaps I might draw a parallel here with the legal profession. Barristers and solicitors are all qualified lawyers, but when a knotty legal problem arises the solicitors refer the matter to the barristers, the experts, in order to obtain the best advice.’

‘Well, I’m afraid I must now leave you to your expertise,’ I said politely, rising to my feet, ‘and descend from the mountain top of the South Canonry to the valley of the Deanery.’ I turned to my hostess. Thanks so much for the tea and sympathy, Mrs Ashworth.’

‘Drop in again soon,’ said my heroine with a smile, ‘and if there’s anything I can do, just let me know.’

‘Yes indeed,’ said the Bishop, suddenly becoming pastoral. ‘If there’s anything we can do –’

‘I’ll see you out, Venetia,’ said his wife, and led the way downstairs to the hall. As she opened the front door she added: ‘You won’t want to lug your suitcases to the Deanery – I’ll ask Charley to bring them over later in the car.’

I thanked her before saying anxiously: ‘I do hope I didn’t upset the Bishop when I answered back.’

‘My dear, he was enthralled! Such a delightful change for him to meet someone who doesn’t treat him as a sacred object on a pedestal.’ She looked at me thoughtfully with her cool dark eyes before musing: ‘Maybe you’ve been concentrating on the wrong age-group; very few young men have the self-assurance or the savoir-faire to cope with clever women. Try looking for something intelligent, well-educated and pushing forty.’

‘It’ll be either married or peculiar.’

‘Not necessarily … Didn’t I hear a rumour once that Eddie Hoffenberg was rather smitten with you?’

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Mrs Ashworth – I’d rather die a virgin spinster!’

Mrs Ashworth merely smiled her enigmatic smile and said: ‘Do keep in touch.’

I drifted away down the drive towards the Deanery.

Eddie Hoffenberg emerged from the Deanery just as I approached the front door, so there was no possibility of avoiding him. My father had once referred to him as ‘Aysgarth’s poodle – that bloody Hun,’ but my father, who had lost his best friends in the First War, was notorious for his anti-German sentiment. Other people, less outspoken than my father, were content to regard Eddie with a polite antipathy. ‘It’s my cross,’ Eddie would say with gloomy relish, and sometimes he would even add: ‘Suffering is good for the soul.’

‘It’s clergymen like Eddie Hoffenberg,’ I had said once to Primrose, ‘who make Christianity look like an exercise in masochism.’

‘It’s Germans like Eddie Hoffenberg,’ said Primrose, ‘who encourage the belief that we were doing them a favour by trying to kill them in the war.’