Produced by Suzanne Shell, Dmitriy Genzel and PG Distributed
Proofreaders
1921
1
Barbara wished she would come back. For the last hour Fanny Waddingtonhad kept on passing in and out of the room through the open door intothe garden, bringing in tulips, white, pink, and red tulips, for theflowered Lowestoft bowls, hovering over them, caressing them with herdelicate butterfly fingers, humming some sort of song to herself.
The song mixes itself up with the Stores list Barbara was making: "Twodozen glass towels. Twelve pounds of Spratt's puppy biscuits. One dozengent.'s all-silk pyjamas, extra large size" … "A-hoom—hoom,a-hoom—hoom" (that Impromptu of Schubert's), and with the notesBarbara was writing: "Mrs. Waddington has pleasure in enclosing…."Fanny Waddington would always have pleasure in enclosing something…."A ho-om—boom, hoom, hee." A sound so light that it hardly stirred thequiet of the room. If a butterfly could hum it would hum like FannyWaddington.
Barbara Madden had not been two days at Lower Wyck Manor, and alreadyshe was at home there; she knew by heart Fanny's drawing-room with thelow stretch of the Tudor windows at each end, their lattices panelled bythe heavy mullions, the back one looking out on to the green gardenbordered with wallflowers and tulips; the front one on to the roundgrass-plot and the sundial, the drive and the shrubbery beyond, down thebroad walk that cut through it into the clear reaches of the park. Sheliked the interior, the Persian carpet faded to patches of grey and fawnand old rose, the port-wine mahogany furniture, the tables thrusting outthe brass claws of their legs, the latticed cabinets and bookcases, thechintz curtains and chair-covers, all red dahlias and powder-blueparrots on a cream-coloured ground. But when Fanny wasn't there youcould feel the room ache with the emptiness she left.
Barbara ached. She caught herself listening for Fanny Waddington's feeton the flagged path and the sound of her humming. As she waited shelooked up at the picture over the bureau in the recess of thefireplace, the portrait in oils of Horatio Bysshe Waddington, Fanny'shusband.
He was seated, heavily seated with his spread width and folded height,in one of the brown-leather chairs of his library, dressed in a tweedcoat, putty-coloured riding breeches, a buff waistcoat, and a grey-bluetie. The handsome, florid face was lifted in a noble pose above thestiff white collar; you could see the full, slightly drooping lower lipunder the shaggy black moustache. There was solemnity in the thick,rounded salient of the Roman nose, in the slightly bulging eyes, and inthe almost imperceptible line that sagged from each nostril down thelong curve of the cheeks. This figure, one great thigh crossed on theother, was extraordinarily solid against the smoky background where theclipped black hair made a watery light. His eyes were not looking atanything in particular. Horatio Bysshe Waddington seemed to be absorbedin some solemn thought.
His wife's portrait hung over the card-table in the other recess.
Barbara hoped he would be nice; she hoped he would be interesting, sinceshe had to be his secretary. But, of course, he would be. Anybody soenchanting as Fanny could never have married him if he wasn't. Shewondered how she, Barbara