A Question of Upbringing - Anthony Powell [92]
For some reason, during the following day in London, I found myself thinking all the time of Le Bas’s visit; although it was long before I came to look upon such transcendental manipulation of surrounding figures almost as a matter of routine. The weather was bad. When the time came, I was glad to find myself in the Donners-Brebner building, although the innate dejection of spirit of that part of London was augmented by regarding its landscape from this huge and shapeless edifice, recently built in a style as wholly without ostensible order as if it were some vast prehistoric cromlech. Stringham’s office was on one of the upper storeys, looking north over the river. It was dark now outside, and lights were reflected in the water, from the oppressive and cheerless, as well as beautiful, riverside. Stringham looked well: better than I had seen him for a long time.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said.
“I’m a bit late.”
“We’ll have a drink.”
“Where shall we make for?”
For a brief second, for an inexpressibly curtailed efflux of time, so short that its duration could be appreciated only in recollection, being immediately engulfed at the moment of birth, I was conscious of a sensation I had never before encountered: an awareness that Stringham was perhaps a trifle embarrassed. He took a step forward, and made as if to pat my head, as one who makes much of an animal.
“There, there,” he said. “Good dog. Don’t growl. The fact is I am cutting your date. Cutting it in slow motion before your eyes.”
“Well?”
“It is an absolutely inexcusable thing to do. I’ve been asked to rather a good party at short notice – and have to dine and go to a play first. As the party can hardly fail to be rather fun, I thought you wouldn’t mind.”
“Of course not.”
“An intolerable act, I admit.”
“Not if it’s a good party.”
“I thought the thing to do would be for you to come back and talk while I changed. Then I could drop you wherever you are going to dine.”
“Let’s do that.”
I could pretend to Stringham that I did not mind: within, I was exceedingly annoyed. This was quite unlike him. A rearrangement of plans would now be necessary. His car was parked outside. We drove northward.
“How are things at the old coll.?”
“Le Bas visited me yesterday.”
“Our former housemaster?”
“Braddock alias Thorne.”
“Good heavens, I had forgotten all about that.”
“I wonder if he has?”
“Did you tell him how it happened?”
“No.”
“How extraordinary for him to swim to the surface.”
“He asked about you.”
“No?”
Stringham was not interested.. Le Bas was scarcely a memory. I began to realise that considerable changes had indeed been taking place.
“What is it like in London?”
“I’m rather enjoying myself. You must come and live here soon.”
“I suppose I shall in due course.”
“Can’t you get sent down? No one could stand three years of university life.”
We arrived at the house, and, passing between the pillars of the doorway, collected drinks in the dining-room. Then we went upstairs. The place seemed less gloomy than on my earlier visit. Stringham’s bedroom was a rather comfortless apartment, looking out on to the roofs of another row of large houses. “Who are you dining with?”
“The Bridgnorths.”
“Haven’t I seen pictures of a rather captivating daughter called Lady Peggy Stepney?”
“The last photograph was taken at Newmarket. I’ve been wondering whether it wasn’t time for her to get married and settle down,” said Stringham. “I seem to have been a bachelor an awfully long time.”
“What does Lady Peggy think about it?”
“There are indications that she does not actively dislike me.”
“Why not, then?”
We talked in a desultory way, Stringham walking to and fro, wearing only a stiff shir