Brian Aldiss - The Squire Quartet

‘I love this place,’ Ash said, as he braked the Peugeot in the drive outside the porch. ‘I’ll buy it off you.’

A dog barked somewhere in an offhand manner.

‘Let’s see if Teresa’s at home.’

The house was early Georgian, built of brick cornered with stone. It replaced a smaller building on the same site which had been destroyed by fire. It owed its existence to an earlier Squire, the vigorous Matthew, born in Norfolk in 1689, in the reign of King James II.

Matthew Squire bought himself a commission in Marlborough’s army and served as liaison officer between Marlborough and Prince Eugene at the battle of Oudenarde in 1708, in which the French were defeated. Matthew’s bravery, his dash, and his command of the German tongue, commended him to Eugene.

The bravery must have been inborn; the command of German was acquired from young Matthew’s mistress, Caroline, the illegitimate daughter of a Westphalian captain of dragoons. With Caroline following behind, Matthew joined Eugene’s army to fight at Peterwardein in 1716. There the Turks were defeated for the last time on European soil.

As victory bells pealed throughout Christendom, Matthew found he had lost a finger and gained a reputation. He was decorated and rewarded by Eugene. He acquired a substantial train of Ottoman booty. Whereupon he retired with his beloved Caroline to his native village, Hartisham. There in the seventeen-thirties he had the present house built and, it is claimed, was the first man to introduce coffee to North Norfolk. Despite lavish expenditures, he ensured the modest fortunes of the Squire family for the next two and a half centuries.

Caroline’s sturdy Westphalian loins provided for the continuance of Matthew’s line. She outlived her husband. He died, a slightly dotty old man with a cork finger, in his seventy-first year, and was buried in St Swithun’s churchyard at almost the same time as Horatio Nelson was entering the world, only a few miles away across the Norfolk meadows.

As the two men climbed from Ash’s Peugeot, a Dalmatian bitch came bounding from the rear of the house and flung herself at Squire.

At the same time, a female voice was heard calling, in hopeless tones, ‘Nellie, Nellie, good girl!’

A plump white-haired lady appeared, carrying a trug in one hand. She paused, then came up smiling, saying, ‘Tom, your dog is quite uncontrollable.’

Squire introduced her to Ash as Mrs Davies, his mother-in-law. She was recently widowed.

‘Where’s Teresa?’ he asked her, patting Nellie’s back.

‘This sunny spell we’re having is beautiful, and yet you know I get so hot,’ she told Ash, with the confidence of one who has regularly enjoyed the attention of men. ‘I never used to get so hot. I mustn’t do any more, but I couldn’t resist pottering. All the poor plants need water. Tess feels the heat too, and I would not be surprised if she hasn’t retired to her own room for a shower and rest. You must have found filming on the beach intolerably hot today, Mr Ash.’

‘Don’t forget that Mr Squire and I were filming in Singapore three months ago,’ said Ash, smiling. ‘It was really warm there.’

They paused on the lower step of the house, Ash slouching, smiling in his flamboyant shirt, hands in his pockets, Mrs Davies shortish but erect, her white hair carefully tended, talking but keeping an eye on Squire, who stood square-based, legs apart, twiddling his bunch of keys. The dog disappeared into the cool of the house.

The symmetry of Pippet Hall was emphasized by its red brick and its white paint, with the plum-coloured door centrally placed. The complete entablature of the doorcase, with a pediment over it, in turn emphasized the sensible centrality of this feature. It was a three-storeyed house, the four sashed windows of the ground floor running almost from floor to ceiling, but diminishing in height floor by floor. A brick parapet ornamented with recessed panels rose above the second-floor windows, half-concealing the truncated pyramid of roof. The chimneys were grouped at either end of the roof, emphasizing the symmetry of the whole.

Five shallow steps rose from the level of the drive to the front step (for the meek Guymell had been known to rise up and flood). Squire led the way up the steps to the panelled door.

‘My husband flew out to Singapore,’ Mrs Davies was telling Ash, ‘by air in the thirties, in a seaplane. I went too. It was very comfortable and we slept on board. I wouldn’t care to go now. Flights are so terribly crowded nowadays, I don’t know how people can bear it. Yet I saw in The Times just yesterday that they’re planning even bigger airliners. Where it will all end I don’t know.’

Squire was edging his friend into the hall. He waited while Mrs Davies talked to Ash. The interior was cool, and silent, apart from the click of the Dalmatian’s claws on the stone tiles as it circled him. This hall was Pippet Hall’s grandest feature, designed to make an immediate impression on guests before they were led to the relatively cramped reception rooms. Stairs led to the upper floor in a graceful double curve; portraits of Matthew and Caroline hung in heavy gilt frames on the half-landing.

‘Where are Ann and Jane?’ he asked sharply.

‘The girls have gone over to Norwich with Grace and their Aunt Deirdre. They’ll be back later,’ said Mrs Davies. ‘They’re wearing their jeans. I told them that dresses were more suitable for Norwich but, no, they would go in their jeans. Ugly things. Do you have children, Mr Ash?’

‘I think I’ll get Grahame a drink, Mother,’ said Squire. ‘Would you like one, too?’

‘I could make you some tea if you liked, and there are some doughnuts from the Crooked Apron. Do you like doughnuts, Mr Ash? They’re terribly fattening …’

Squire manoeuvred Ash and his mother-in-law into the living room and poured both Ash and himself large vodkas-on-the-rocks. Leaving Ash to his conversation, he went off in search of his wife. The dog sat at the bottom of the stairs, watching him mournfully, knowing well that Dalmatians were not allowed upstairs.

Music sounded faintly along the upper corridor. Teresa had taken over the room at the south-east corner of the house. Squire tapped lightly at the door and went in.

The room was shaded. The curtain at the long south-facing window had been drawn to keep out the sun; but a thin beam, shining through the window set in the other wall, painted a line of gold across the white-and-green carpet, as if to emphasize the shadow into which the rest of the room had been plunged.

Teresa had furnished the room with rattan chairs and sofas, each with a white cushion, and all recently purchased from an artistic shop in Fakenham. There were several large plants, two monstera delicosa reaching almost to the ceiling, a rubber plant, and an aspidistra. The general effect was that an attempt had been made to recreate a Malayan environment, but the sofa had been pushed aside to make room for a white formica desk and a work table at which Teresa now sat.

The table was littered with rolls of plastic and wire and a cluttered miscellany of paint pots on a tray. Beneath the table were boxes and litter. On the walls hung the results of Teresa’s labours, fantastic insects of all sorts, beetles with amazing horns, moths with wings of gold, butterflies with eyes in their wings. These exotic creatures of wire and plastic glowed with the light from the floor, the unusual angle of illumination giving them an unexpected and even sinister aspect.

‘Tess! Are you all right?’

She had been sitting looking through the window, holding a paint brush in one hand. Although she turned to look at Squire, the end of the brush remained between her teeth, slightly wrinkling her upper lip.