Anthony Powell - The Valley of Bones

‘Yes.’

‘Is Lance-Corporal Tolland there?’

‘Who is speaking?’

He named some army unit. As I returned to the dining-room, a knocking came from the front door. I told Robert he was wanted on the telephone.

‘Shall I answer the door, Frederica?’

‘It’s probably the vicar about a light showing,’ she said. ‘He’s an air-raid warden and frightfully fussy. Bring him in, if it is. He might like a cup of coffee.’

However, a tall naval officer was on the step when I opened the door. He had just driven up in a car.

‘This is Lady Frederica Budd’s house?’

‘Yes.’

‘I must apologize for calling at this hour of the night, but I believe my step-daughter, Mrs Wisebite, is staying here.’

‘She is.’

‘There are some rather urgent business matters to talk over with her. I heard she was here for a day or two, and thought Lady Frederica would not mind if I dropped in for a moment. I am stationed in the neighbourhood — at her brother, Lord Warminster’s house, as a matter of fact.’

‘Come in. You’re Commander Foxe, aren’t you. I’m Nicholas Jenkins. We’ve met once or twice in the past.’

‘Good God, of course we have,’ said Buster. ‘This is your sister-in-law’s house?’

‘Yes.’

‘You were a friend of Charles’s, weren’t you. This is splendid.’

Commander Foxe did not sound as if he thought finding me at Frederica’s was as splendid as all that, even though he seemed relieved that his arrival would be cushioned by an introduction. Another sponsor would certainly be preferable, since any old friend of Stringham’s was bound to have heard many stories to his own discredit. However, Buster, although he had that chronic air some men possess of appearing to consider all other men potential rivals, put a reasonably good face on it. For my own part, I suddenly thought of what Dicky Umfraville had told me. He would hardly welcome this arrival. There was nothing to be done about that. I took Buster along to the sitting-room, where the rest of the party were now sitting. Buster had evidently planned a fairly dramatic entry.

‘I really must apologize, Lady Frederica—’ he began to say, as he came through the door.

Following him into the room, I saw at once something disagreeable had happened. Robert appeared to be the centre of attention. He had evidently just announced news consequent on his telephone call. Everyone looked disturbed. Flavia Wisebite seemed near tears. When she saw Commander Foxe, her distress turned to furious annoyance.

‘Buster,’ she said sharply, ‘where on earth have you come from?*

She sounded very cross, so cross that for a moment she forgot how upset she was. Commander Foxe must have grasped that his arrival was not altogether welcome at the moment. He was plainly taken aback by that. Smiling uneasily, he glanced round the room, as if to recover himself by finding some friendly face. His eyes rested first on Dicky Umfraville. Umfraville held out his hand.

‘Hullo, Buster,’ he said, ‘a long time since we met.’

When people really hate one another, the tension within them can sometimes make itself felt throughout a room, like atmospheric waves, first hot, then cold, wafted backwards and forwards, as if in an invisible process of air conditioning, creating a pervasive physical disturbance. Buster Foxe and Dicky Umfraville, between them, brought about that state. Their really overpowering mutual detestation dominated for a moment all other local agitations. The fact that neither party was going to come out in the open at this stage made the currents of nervous electricity generated by suppressed emotion even more powerful. At the same time, to anyone who did not know what horrors linked them together, they might have appeared a pair of old friends, met after an age apart. Their distinct, though imprecise, physical similarity increased this last impression. Before Buster could do more than make a gesture of acknowledgment in Umfraville’s direction, Frederica came forward. Buster began once more to apologize, to explain he wanted only a brief word with Flavia, then be gone. Frederica listened to him.

‘We’re all in rather a stew here at the moment,’ she said. ‘My brother Robert has just heard his leave is cancelled. He has to go back as soon as possible.’

Buster was obviously put out at finding himself in the disadvantageous position of having to listen to someone else’s troubles, when he had come with the express object of stating his own. It had to be admitted he looked immensely distinguished, more so even than Umfraville. I had never before seen Commander Foxe in naval uniform. It suited him. His iron-grey hair, of which he still possessed plenty, was kept short on a head almost preternaturally small, as Umfraville had pointed out. Good looks, formerly of a near film-star quality, had settled down in middle-age to an appearance at once solid and forcible, a bust of the better type of Roman senator. A DSC was among his medal ribbons. I thought of Umfraville’s lament that the heroes of yesterday are the maquereaux of tomorrow. Something had undoubtedly vexed Commander Foxe a great deal. He attempted, without much success, to assume a sympathetic expression about the subject of Robert’s leave cancellation. Clearly ignorant of any connexion between Flavia and Robert, he was at a loss to understand why Flavia was so disturbed. After her first outburst, she had forgotten about Buster again, and was gazing at Robert, her eyes full of tears.

‘Surely you can take a train tomorrow,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to leave tonight, darling. What trains are there, Frederica?’

‘Not very good ones,’ said Frederica. ‘But they’ll get you there sooner or later. Why don’t you do that, Robert?’

‘Aren’t you taking the army too seriously, Robert?’ said Umfraville. ‘Having just sent you on leave, they can’t expect you to go back at a moment’s notice. Your unit doesn’t know Nick is going back by car tonight. Even if you are a bit late, there’s nothing the authorities can do to you, if they countermand their own orders in this way.’

‘That’s not the point,’ said Robert.

This was the only time I had ever seen Robert fairly near to what might be called a state of excitement. He was knocking his closed fists together gently.

‘If I don’t get back before tomorrow night,’ he said, ‘I may miss the overseas draft. My name is only included in the list on sufferance anyway. If they’ve got an excuse, they’ll remove it. That was the Orderly Room Sergeant on the line. He’s rather a friend of mine, and was giving me warning about that. Of course he couldn’t say it straight out, but he made his meaning quite clear to me. There are rows of other corporals they can send, if a party has been ordered to move forthwith. That’s what it looks like. Besides, I don’t want to have to make all my arrangements about packing and so on at the very last moment. That was why I thought your friend Stevens might be able to fit me into his car, Nick. You could then disgorge me somewhere in the neighbourhood of Mytchett. I could walk the last lap, if you landed me reasonably near.’

‘It won’t be very comfortable in the car, but I don’t see why you shouldn’t come with us.’

‘When is Stevens arriving?’

‘Any time now.’

‘I’ll go and get my things ready,’ said Robert.

He went off upstairs. Flavia began to dab her eyes with a rolled-up handkerchief. Buster must have remembered he had met Priscilla before — at the party his wife had given for Moreland’s symphony — and he filled in the time during this discussion about Robert’s affairs by talking to her. That was also perhaps a method of avoiding Dicky Umfraville’s eye. Buster was accompanying this conversation with a great display of middle-aged masculine charm. From time to time, he glanced in Flavia’s direction to see if she were sufficiently calm to be tackled about whatever he hoped to speak. Now, Flavia, making an effort to recover herself, moved towards Buster of her own volition.