The Middle Age of Mrs Eliot Read online

  THE MIDDLE AGE OF MRS ELIOT

  ANGUS WILSON

  TO

  JOHN WITH GRATITUDE

  AND TO

  HELEN’S LOVED

  MEMORY

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  BOOK ONE: HUMPTY DUMPTY

  BOOK TWO: JOBS FOR JOB

  BOOK THREE: NURSERY INS AND OUTS

  About the Author

  Copyright

  BOOK ONE

  HUMPTY DUMPTY

  MEG ELIOT was well aware that in taking her place as Chairman of the Committee for the third time in succession she was acting in an unconstitutional way. The rules of ‘Aid to the Elderly’, as old Mr Purdyke had pointed out, were quite clear on this point. The chair was to be taken in rotation. As she sat once more at the centre of the table, with Lady Pirie on her left and old Mr Purdyke on her right, and with young Mr Darlington, the secretary, covering the end of the table with his neat files and card indexes, she wondered why exactly she set such store by getting her own way on this point. It seemed absurd on the face of it: Aid to the Elderly was only a medium-sized charitable organization and acting as chairman only brought more chores. In any case she had got her own way only because September with its holiday absences usually saw no more than the minimum statutory attendance of three. Had that ghastly old battleaxe Mrs Masters been there she would have fought tooth and nail to keep Meg in her place.

  Meg felt a bit ashamed when she considered how she had persuaded them; she had made much of the fact that she would be playing truant for the next six months. She was much concerned that her superior financial position allowed her to take this jaunt round the world, so much beyond the purses of the other committee members; she had been anxious to atone for it. ‘Do, for goodness’ sake, work me to death while I’m still here,’ she had said to them many times, yet the truth was that it was no atonement at all – at any rate not to her. She liked to be chairman, she liked to dominate any group of people with whom she worked. It had been the same with the Red Cross in the war. Other people make such stupid mistakes, she thought, and then she laughed at her own vanity. I may have been good for Aid to the Elderly, she thought, but I very much doubt if Aid to the Elderly has been good for me. They spoil me too much. They are easy game. A society which, despite its employment of trained social workers, was still palpably a charity, an organization which for all its occasional government grants was so much an old-fashioned voluntary body of a now dying kind, did not expect that a woman like herself should choose to be on its committee at all. She was, she knew, better off than many of the committee members – than the ‘new poor’ like Lady Pirie. And even if there were some wealthy ones, they were people who ‘lived quietly’, whereas she and Bill spent as it came. It was not surprising that they thought her rich and an especially dazzling sort of rich – not at all of the stolid rich, but of the fashionable and lively rich. She knew exactly how they saw her when she heard Viola Pirie describe her as ‘the younger hostess type, you know’. Her fluency in saying absurd or ironic things made them think her smartly ‘irreverent’, essentially worldly. And, as she well knew from the past, to conventional people her height and her irregular features qualified her as a ‘striking woman’. Viola had told her that the committee were agreed in describing her as ‘exotic looking’. She was very conscious of being forty-three, but since that was ten years less than any of the others, they no doubt thought of her as young. In any case, she thought, I don’t seem my age and I don’t believe, thank God, that I look as though I’ve ‘kept going’.

  It was hardly surprising that Aid to the Elderly should think of her as a ‘catch’. It was more surprising that she should feel pleased that they did so. She had, of course, had to fight the few diehards who saw no need for ‘catches’, and who were suspicious of anyone from the smart world who wanted to meddle in the world of social service. She had, at any rate, forced them to feel that it was wiser to keep their doubts to themselves. Perhaps it was that victory, she decided, that made her pleased, but if so it wasn’t really good enough – the victory was such an easy one. As old Mr Purdyke had said, ‘Mrs Eliot’s so quick, she rather leaves us standing. But I’m sure it’s been very good for us all to be shaken up.’ Viola Pirie, of course, in her mothering moods sometimes pulled her up sharply with a gruff, downright snub – but then Viola was happy to be known as a barker rather than a biter.

  In gaining her mastery of the committee, however, Mr Darlington had been the greatest help to her, but then so had she been to him. When she found that he was a trained social worker brought in at the suggestion of the Ministry, she had immediately been on his side. She wondered for a moment if she was not too impressed by trained people; it was partly having missed the University herself, partly her brother David’s academic training that had influenced her. Anyhow she’d been all for Darlington immediately.

  The others, conscious that to refuse the Ministry’s suggestion would be to lose the Ministry’s occasional grants, had not been all for him. She hadn’t really understood a lot of his modern university-trained methods, and when she had understood, she’d been a bit doubtful of some of them, but she had backed him against the others. He was obviously grateful and probably a bit affected by the paradox of having a fashionable woman for an ally. She was pretty sure that his idea of a useful world had not previously included fashionable women. Then, like her, he had a strong sense of the ridiculous, and she had encouraged him to think that, far from being a frivolity, it was in some way a necessary part of the ‘modern’ approach to the alleviation of human misery.

  Meg came to from her reverie and felt a peculiar pleasure in realizing that she had been able to deal with three cases of aged hardship, and had used sense and humanity, while her mind had really been elsewhere. She felt, as in everything she did, a battle between this self-consciousness, between her histrionic enjoyment of it, and her certainty that she cared seriously and completely for the work itself. She had always to keep in check the self-mockery that would have persuaded her that her ‘good’, ‘genuine’ motives were only the protective product of a ‘real’, ‘unworthy’ desire to win applause. To strengthen her confidence in her own ‘sincerity’ she assumed a serious direct gaze and a frown, conscious at the same time that for her colleagues this only added to her charm – made her, for them, a child playing at ‘hospitals’ or at ‘working in the office’. But as she went on dealing with the affairs of the afternoon meeting, absorption in immediate problems pushed the self-consciousness away into a remote corner of her mind, whence it issued only in momentary jabs of self-ridicule.

  ‘Mrs Mountain’s granddaughter has come along,’ Mr Darlington said, as he filed away the draft of the letter they had decided to send to old Mr Runcorn’s sharp-practising landlord. ‘Miss Rank tells me she was somewhat unwilling. The bus journey from Brixton apparently brings on sickness. But,’ he smiled, ‘I understand that a reminder that the society might have to discontinue home-help to her grandmother, unless there was some family cooperation, lessened the dangers of this malady.’ This was a familiar type of joke to the committee, but one which helped to ease the strain of their work and they were all smiles.

  ‘I don’t believe,’ Meg said, ‘that people are ever sick in buses. One hears about it a lot, but I’ve never seen it. However, I think, in view of this cooperation, we should see her immediately.’ She looked at Lady Pirie and Mr Purdyke in turn, but without waiting for their verbal agreement, she said, ‘Ask her to come in, Mr Darlington, will you, please?’

  She anticipated with satisfaction a tarty girl, for she had found rather to her surprise that her own chic, instead of antagonizing, seemed to induce c
ooperation from the more showy daughters or granddaughters of Aid to the Elderly’s protégés. The young woman who came in was neat, dowdy, and sullen looking. Meg felt immediately the challenge of producing a response that would not come easily.

  ‘Thank you for coming here, Mrs Crowe,’ she said, as the young woman sat down. There was no answer. Meg, elbows on the table, cupped her hands in front of her.

  ‘We wanted so much to see you before the winter came on. You see, although your grandmother’s a remarkable person and very independent, she is getting to the stage where she needs a lot of things done for her. Especially in the winter time.’ She paused, but there was silence.

  ‘We’ve been willing to do all we can,’ she went on. ‘Miss Rank does shopping and a lot of housework. But we have a great number of old people to help who have no family at all. We have to consider that.’

  ‘It’s a long bus journey down there,’ Mrs Crowe said, ‘and I get sick in buses. I told Miss Rank that.’

  ‘Your grandmother’s very lonely, you know,’ Lady Pirie began, but Meg took it up.

  ‘You’ve no idea, perhaps,’ she said, ‘how much she looks forward to seeing her family. You see she’s very shy with strangers, even with Miss Rank. They fuss her. That’s why we do so want to avoid an old people’s home as long at any rate as we possibly can.’

  ‘You want me to have her with us?’ Mrs Crowe said, looking down at the table.

  ‘Well,’ Mr Purdyke said, ‘if there is no other …’ But Meg smiled across at Mrs Crowe.

  ‘You’re quite right. We do,’ she said, ‘that’s why we asked you here. As you know.’ She caught the woman’s eye and they both smiled.

  ‘I knew it all right,’ Mrs Crowe said, resuming her grim look. But she sat less stiffly.

  ‘She’ll ask very little, you know,’ Meg said, ‘and she goes to bed very early.’

  ‘It’ll mean going without the lodger’s money,’ Mrs Crowe announced.

  Mr Purdyke stirred angrily. ‘Your grandmother brought you up, didn’t she?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, she was good to me,’ Mrs Crowe said, ‘I’m not saying anything against that. But I’m not going to pretend I want her with us. I’ve got my husband and Cecil and the twins. We’re happy as we are. But, of course, if it’s our duty …’

  ‘I think it is,’ Lady Pirie said,

  Meg leaned forward as though she were about to touch Mrs Crowe’s sleeve. ‘Oh, no,’ she cried, ‘that wouldn’t work at all. I don’t think you’d feel happy on that basis, and I’m sure Mrs Mountain wouldn’t. But you must race the alternative. We can’t do any more.’

  ‘You want me to take her in out of pity,’ Mrs Crowe said.

  ‘I don’t know that that’s the word I’d choose,’ Meg said, ‘but that would be a beginning. What’s most important is that you should make her as happy as you can.’

  ‘Oh, we’d do our part by her all right if she came to us. But out of pity is what it would be.’

  Meg stifled an impulse to carry the argument further.

  ‘I’ll talk to my husband about it,’ Mrs Crowe said.

  ‘Thank you. You know Mr Darlington and Miss Rank. If you want to discuss it further with them, they’re always ready to help,’ Meg said and brought the interview to an end with a handshake.

  The others seemed most satisfied with the outcome of Mrs Crowe’s visit.

  Lady Pirie said, ‘They’ll shake down,’ and Mr Purdyke, ‘She was more frightened to take the first step than anything, I think. But with Mrs Eliot’s able assistance …’

  Meg, silent, appeared to wait on a word from Mr Darlington, but when he said, ‘From what Miss Rank tells me, the husband doesn’t count, so I think we can hope to remove Mrs Mountain from our files. It’s wonderful what a little faith will do,’ she looked at her watch impatiently.

  ‘Is there anything else?’ she asked. ‘It’s after four.’

  Mr Darlington said rather quickly, ‘There is this business of Mrs Tucker’s gin.’

  ‘Mrs Tucker’s gin!’ Lady Pirie laughed. ‘Surely that can wait until next time. Meg’s obviously longing for her tea.’

  Mr Darlington said, ‘Well, I had hoped …’ and he looked at Meg.

  ‘Of course we’ll deal with it,’ she cried, ‘but let’s have a cup of tea while we’re doing so.’

  ‘If you remember,’ said Mr Darlington, when the office caretaker had produced tea and ginger nuts, ‘we had assigned Mrs Tucker to our new social visitor. We thought she was a good easy case for Miss Rogers to get her hand in on. She’s not very mobile but perfectly clean and an easy-going person.’

  ‘There’s some contradiction there,’ Mr Purdyke said, ‘as to mobility, you know.’

  Lady Pirie made a snorting noise. Someone, she felt, had always to mark Mr Purdyke’s jokes. Mr Darlington accepted her snort as sufficient mark to allow him to continue.

  ‘Everything seemed to be going very well from Miss Rogers’ account. But I’m afraid that isn’t altogether correct. Miss Rank went in to see Mrs Tucker last week and found her in a very upset state. It seems that Miss Rogers has refused to bring her her weekly nip of gin.’

  Meg always approved the slight note of irony with which Mr Darlington gave his reports. She felt that it added to his sincerity, as any touch of moral earnestness would have removed from it.

  ‘Refused?’ Meg said. ‘Well, you must tell Miss Rogers that we are not a temperance society. She’s perfectly entitled to her own views about drink, but Mrs Tucker’s equally entitled to her gin.’

  ‘Oh, I should have done so in the ordinary way, but Miss Rogers tells me she referred the matter to a member of the committee and was told that she shouldn’t encourage the old woman in drinking.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ Mr Purdyke said. He disliked all rows.

  ‘You know,’ Lady Pirie said gruffly, ‘I think this had better hang over, Mr Darlington, until this member of the committee’s present.’

  ‘I don’t agree,’ Meg declared. ‘Mrs Masters has absolutely no right

  ‘We don’t know that Mr Darlington’s referring to Mrs Masters,’ Mr Purdyke put in.

  ‘I do,’ said Meg. She lit a cigarette and drank some of the thick brown tea to relax her annoyance.

  ‘I’m not going back over all this,’ she said, ‘don’t worry. But it’s one thing for Mrs Masters to bring in an untrained girl against the committee’s advice

  ‘Against yours’ Mr Purdyke said. ‘Be honest, Mrs Eliot.’

  ‘I don’t particularly want to be honest when the rest of the committee behaves so spinelessly.’ She smiled at Mr Darlington.

  ‘All right,’ she amended, ‘against my advice and Mr Darlington’s.’

  ‘Mr Darlington is not a member of the committee,’ Lady Pirie said with a chuckle intended to appease the secretary.

  ‘Mr Darlington has to manage the staff,’ Meg declared. ‘All right. The thing’s done. We have Mrs Masters’ old governess’s great-niece or whatever other piece of family piety. An untrained social visitor. But she is responsible to Mr Darlington and through him to the committee as a whole. Not Mrs Masters’ personal employee.’

  ‘Now Meg,’ Lady Pirie said. She remembered at times that she had after all brought Meg Eliot into the work of the Society. ‘I do think we should wait until Mrs Masters is here.’

  ‘I know you do, Viola, but I don’t trust you all not to let Mr Darlington down. He’s responsible for Miss Rogers’ work.’

  ‘I can’t help thinking,’ Mr Purdyke said, ‘that it would not be fair to say anything before we’ve talked to Miss Rogers herself. I’m sure Darlington won’t mind my saying so.’

  ‘I think she may be in the office,’ Mr Darlington said,

  ‘Oh dear,’ Mr Purdyke complained.

  ‘You mean you know she is,’ Lady Pirie declared.

  ‘Mr Darlington’s very efficient, Viola,’ Meg smiled at him and he faintly smiled back.

  ‘There are other words for it,’ Lady Pirie said, laughing.


  ‘Ask her to come in,’ Meg requested. ‘But before you do so, what do you think of her general work?’

  Mr Darlington’s rather cherubic face looked earnest, his small mouth set gravely.

  He looks like a hockey-playing spinster when he’s trying to be fair to people, Meg thought; he’s a nice man and I’m all on his side, but how do women marry such unromantic little men?

  ‘To be perfectly fair,’ he began.

  ‘You don’t have to be perfectly fair,’ Meg said. She could not bear him to look so solemn.

  ‘Oh yes, he does,’ Lady Pirie said.

  ‘Well, don’t fall over backwards doing it,’ Meg amended.

  Mr Darlington smiled. ‘Shall I go on?’ he asked and continued, ‘I think she might be very good. Of course, she’d be better if she’d had some training. But she’s hard working and sensible. Her manner’s a bit unfortunate at times but I suspect’ – he assumed his professional psychological air – ‘that she’s nervous at having got the job by unorthodox means.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s a very fortunate phrase to use about any girl,’ Meg commented, ‘but you think the Society should try to keep her?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mr Darlington, ‘I do.’

  ‘Well,’ said Meg and she smiled at Lady Pirie, ‘we must try, then, mustn’t we?’

  Miss Rogers’ manner that afternoon was certainly most unfortunate. She was a heavy busted and broad hipped young woman and she scowled at the committee from beneath a fringe of black hair. Mr Darlington placed a chair for her which she ignored. Meg did not smile at her but she said:

  ‘We just wanted to know how you were liking the work, Miss Rogers.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘Good. I’m glad of that because Mr Darlington’s given such a good report of you that we shouldn’t want to lose you.’

  Miss Rogers said nothing but she sat down.

  ‘The Latimer Road area’s not the nicest beginning,’ Meg said. ‘If she’s survived that she’ll survive anything, don’t you think, Mr Purdyke?’