He paused, and then added, ‘That young fellow, Jeremy. What do you know about him?’
Clarissa smiled again. ‘Jeremy? He’s very amusing,’ she replied.
‘Ptscha!’ Sir Rowland snorted. ‘That’s all people seem to care about these days.’ He gave Clarissa a serious look, and continued, ‘You won’t—you won’t do anything foolish, will you?’
Clarissa laughed. ‘Don’t fall in love with Jeremy Warrender,’ she answered him. ‘That’s what you mean, isn’t it?’
Sir Rowland still regarded her seriously. ‘Yes,’ he told her, ‘that’s precisely what I mean. He’s obviously very fond of you. Indeed, he seems unable to keep his hands off you. But you have a very happy marriage with Henry, and I wouldn’t want you to do anything to put that in jeopardy.’
Clarissa gave him an affectionate smile. ‘Do you really think I would do anything so foolish?’ she asked, playfully.
‘That would certainly be extremely foolish,’ Sir Rowland advised. He paused before continuing, ‘You know, Clarissa darling, I’ve watched you grow up. You really mean a great deal to me. If ever you’re in trouble of any kind, you would come to your old guardian, wouldn’t you?’
‘Of course, Roly darling,’ Clarissa replied. She kissed him on the cheek. ‘And you needn’t worry about Jeremy. Really, you needn’t. I know he’s very engaging, and attractive and all that. But you know me, I’m only enjoying myself. Just having fun. It’s nothing serious.’
Sir Rowland was about to speak again when Miss Peake suddenly appeared at the French windows.
Miss Peake had by now discarded her boots, and was in her stockinged feet. She was carrying a head of broccoli.
‘I hope you don’t mind my coming in this way, Mrs Hailsham-Brown,’ she boomed, as she strode across to the sofa. ‘I shan’t make the room dirty, I’ve left my boots outside. I’d just like you to look at this broccoli.’ She thrust it belligerently over the back of the sofa and under Clarissa’s nose.
‘It—er—it looks very nice,’ was all Clarissa could think of by way of reply.
Miss Peake pushed the broccoli at Sir Rowland. ‘Take a look,’ she ordered him.
Sir Rowland did as he was told and pronounced his verdict. ‘I can’t see anything wrong with it,’ he declared. But he took the broccoli from her in order to give it a closer investigation.
‘Of course there’s nothing wrong with it,’ Miss Peake barked at him. ‘I took another one just like this into the kitchen yesterday, and that woman in the kitchen—’ She broke off to add, by way of parenthesis, ‘Of course, I don’t want to say anything against your servants, Mrs Hailsham-Brown, though I could say a great deal.’ Returning to her main theme, she continued, ‘But that Mrs Elgin actually had the nerve to tell me that it was such a poor specimen she wasn’t going to cook it. She said something about, “If you can’t do better than that in the kitchen garden, you’d better take up some other job.” I was so angry I could have killed her.’
Clarissa began to speak, but Miss Peake ploughed on regardless. ‘Now you know I never want to make trouble,’ she insisted, ‘but I’m not going into that kitchen to be insulted.’ After a brief pause for breath, she resumed her tirade. ‘In future,’ she announced, ‘I shall dump the vegetables outside the back door, and Mrs Elgin can leave a list there—’
Sir Rowland at this point attempted to hand the broccoli back to her, but Miss Peake ignored him, and continued, ‘She can leave a list there of what is required.’ She nodded her head emphatically.
Neither Clarissa nor Sir Rowland could think of anything to say in reply, and just as the gardener opened her mouth to speak again the telephone rang. ‘I’ll answer it,’ she bellowed. She crossed to the phone and lifted the receiver. ‘Hello—yes,’ she barked into the mouthpiece, wiping the top of the table with a corner of her overall as she spoke. ‘This is Copplestone Court—You want Mrs Brown?—Yes, she’s here.’
Miss Peake held out the receiver, and Clarissa stubbed out her cigarette, went over to the phone, and took the receiver from her.
‘Hello,’ said Clarissa, ‘This is Mrs Hailsham-Brown.—Hello—hello.’ She looked at Miss Peake. ‘How odd,’ she exclaimed. ‘They seem to have rung off.’
As Clarissa replaced the receiver, Miss Peake suddenly darted to the console table and set it back against the wall. ‘Excuse me,’ she boomed, ‘but Mr Sellon always liked this table flat against the wall.’
Clarissa surreptitiously pulled a face at Sir Rowland, but hastened nevertheless to assist Miss Peake with the table. ‘Thank you,’ said the gardener. ‘And,’ she added, ‘you will be careful about marks made with glasses on the furniture, won’t you, Mrs Brown-Hailsham.’ Clarissa looked anxiously at the table as the gardener corrected herself. ‘I’m sorry—I mean Mrs Hailsham-Brown.’ She laughed in a hearty fashion. ‘Oh well, Brown-Hailsham, Hailsham-Brown,’ she continued. ‘It’s really all the same thing, isn’t it?’
‘No, it’s not, Miss Peake,’ Sir Rowland declared, with very distinct enunciation. ‘After all, a horse chestnut is hardly the same thing as a chestnut horse.’
While Miss Peake was laughing jovially at this, Hugo came into the room. ‘Hello, there,’ she greeted him. ‘I’m getting a regular ticking off. Quite sarcastic, they’re being.’ Going across to Hugo, she thumped him on the back, and then turned to the others. ‘Well, good night, all,’ she shouted. ‘I must be toddling back. Give me the broccoli.’
Sir Rowland handed it over. ‘Horse chestnut—chestnut horse,’ she boomed at him. ‘Jolly good—I must remember that.’ With another boisterous laugh she disappeared through the French windows.
Hugo watched her leave, and then turned to Clarissa and Sir Rowland. ‘How on earth does Henry bear that woman?’ he wondered aloud.
‘He does actually find her very hard to take,’ Clarissa replied. She picked up Pippa’s book from the easy chair, put it on the table and collapsed into the chair as Hugo responded, ‘I should think so. She’s so damned arch! All that hearty schoolgirl manner.’
‘A case of arrested development, I’m afraid,’ Sir Rowland added, shaking his head.
Clarissa smiled. ‘I agree she’s maddening,’ she said, ‘but she’s a very good gardener and, as I keep telling everyone, she goes with the house, and since the house is so wonderfully cheap—’
‘Cheap? Is it?’ Hugo interrupted her. ‘You surprise me.’
‘Marvellously cheap,’ Clarissa told him. ‘It was advertised. We came down and saw it a couple of months ago, and took it then and there for six months, furnished.’
‘Whom does it belong to?’ Sir Rowland asked.
‘It used to belong to a Mr Sellon,’ Clarissa replied. ‘But he died. He was an antique dealer in Maidstone.’
‘Ah, yes!’ Hugo exclaimed. ‘That’s right. Sellon and
