Scoop-Evelyn-Waugh [4]
"Nay not so much as out of bed? When all the birds have Matins said..."
He sang, in his heart, to the recumbent figures above him. And then, wheezing heavily, with crumbs on his mouth, ponderously straddling across the morning-room, came Troutbeck, the aged "boy," bearing a telegram. Curiosity and resentment contended for mastery in Troutbeck's demeanour: curiosity because telegrams were of rare occurrence at Boot Magna; resentment at the interruption of his "elevenses" �a lavish and ruminative feast which occupied the servants' hall from ten-thirty until noon. William's face quickly reassured him that he had not been called from the table on any frivolous pretext. "Bad news," he was able to report. "Shocking bad news for Master William." "It couldn't hardly be a death," said the third housemaid. "All the family's here." "Whatever it was we shall soon know," said Troutbeck. "It struck Master William all of a heap. Might I thank you to pass the chutney." Bad news indeed! Oblivious to the sunshine and the grazing horses and the stertorous breathing of his Uncle Theodore, William reread the frightful doom that had fallen on him.
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"Nothing serious, I hope!" said Uncle Theodore, to whom telegrams, in the past, had from time to time brought news as disquieting as to any man living. "Yes," said William. "I have been called to London." "Have you, my boy? That's interesting. I was thinking of running up for a night myself ..." But Uncle Theodore was speaking to the air. William was already at work, setting into motion the elaborate household machinery which would, too soon, effect his departure.
After an early luncheon, William went to say good-bye to his grandmother. She looked at him with doleful, mad eyes. "Going to London, eh? Well I hardly suppose I shall be alive when you return. Wrap up warm, dear." It was eternal Winter in Mrs. Boot's sunny bedroom. All the family who had the use of their legs attended on the steps to see William off � Priscilla bathed in tears of penitence. Nannie Bloggs sent him down three golden sovereigns. Aunt Anne's motor car was there to take him away. At the last moment Uncle Theodore attempted to get in at the off side, but was detected and deterred. "Just wanted to see a chap in Jermyn Street about some business," he said wistfully. It was always a solemn thing for a Boot to go to London; solemn as a funeral for William on this afternoon. Once or twice on the way to the station, once or twice as the train stopped on the route to Paddington, William was tempted to give up the expedition in despair. Why should he commit himself to this abominable city merely to be railed at and, for all he knew of Lord Copper's temperament, physically assaulted? But sterner counsels prevailed. He might bluff it out. Lord Copper was a townsman, a provincial townsman at that, and certainly did not know the difference between a badger and a great crested grebe. It was William's word against a few cantankerous correspondents and people who write to the newspapers are proverbially unbalanced. By the time he reached Westbury he had sketched out a little scene for himself, in which he stood resolutely in the board room defying the doctrinaire zoology of Fleet Street; every inch a Boot, thrice descended from Ethelred the Unready, rightful 15th Baron de Butte, haughty as a chieftain, honest as a peasant. "Lord Copper," he was saying, "no man shall call me a liar unchastised. The great crested grebe does hibernate." He went to the dining-car and ordered some whisky. The steward said, "We're serving teas. Whisky after Reading." After Reading he tried again. "We�re serving dinners. I'll bring you one to your carriage." When it came, William spilled it down his tie. He gave the steward one of Nannie Blogg's sovereigns in mistake for a shilling. It was contemptuously refused and everyone in the carriage stared at him. A man in a bowler hat said, "May I look? Don't often see one of them nowadays. Tell you what I'll do, I'll toss you for it. Call." William said, "Heads." "Tails it is," said the man in the bowler hat, putting it in his waistcoat pocket. He then went on reading his paper and everyone stared harder at William. His spirits began to sink; the mood of defiance passed. It was always the way; the moment he left the confines of Boot Magna he found himself in a foreign and hostile world. There was a train back at ten o'clock that night. Wild horses would not keep him from it. He would see Lord Copper, explain the situation fully and frankly, throw himself upon his mercy and, successful or defeated, catch the train at ten. By Reading he had worked out this new and humble policy. He would tell Lord Copper about Priscilla's tears; great men were proverbially vulnerable to appeals of that kind. The man opposite looked over the top of his paper. "Got any more quids?" "No," said William. "Pity." At seven he reached Paddington and the atrocious city was all around him.