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Section twenty seven. Gently, the
yellow curtain with all the birds of paradise

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blew out, and it seemed as
if there were a flight of wings into

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the room, right out, then
sucked back, for the windows were open.

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Was it drafty? Ellie Henderson wandered. She was subject to chills,

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but it did not matter that she
should come down sneezing to morrow. It

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was the girls with their naked shoulders. She thought of, being trained to

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think of others by an old father, an invalid late Vicar of Burton,

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but he was dead now, and
her chills never went to her chest.

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Never. It was the girl she
thought of, the young girls with their

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bare shoulders, she herself having always
been a wisp of a creature, with

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her thin hair and meager profile,
though now past fifty, there was beginning

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to shine through some mild beam,
something purified into distinction by years of self

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abnegation, but obscured again perpetually by
her distressing gentility, her panic fear,

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which arose from three hundred pounds income, and her weaponless state. She could

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not earn a penny, and it
made her timid and more and more disqualified,

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year by year to meet well dressed
people who did this sort of thing

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every night of the season, merely
telling their maids, I'll wear so and

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so, whereas Ellie Henderson ran out
nervously and bought cheap pink flowers half a

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dozen, and then threw a shawl
over her old black dress for her.

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Invitation to Clarissa's party had come at
the last moment. She was not quite

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happy about it. She had a
sort of feeling that Clarissa had not meant

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to ask her this year. Why
should she? There was no reason,

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really, except that they had always
known each other, indeed they were cousins,

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but naturally they had rather drifted apart. Clarissa being so sought after,

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it was an event to her going
to a party. It was quite a

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treat, just to see the lovely
clothes. Wasn't that Elizabeth grown up with

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her hair done in the fashionable way
in the pink dress. Yet she could

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not be more than seventeen. She
was very, very handsome. But girls

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when they first came out didn't seem
to wear white as they used, she

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must remember to tell Edith. Girls
wore straight frocks, perfectly tight, with

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skirts well above the ankles. It
was not becoming, she thought, so

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with her weak eyesight, Ellie Henderson
craned rather forward, and it wasn't so

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much she who mine did, not
having anyone to talk to, she hardly

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knew anybody there, for she felt
that they were all such interesting people to

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watch, politicians, presumably Richard Dollaway's
friends. But it was Richard himself who

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felt that he could not let the
poor creature go on standing there all the

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evening by herself. Well, Ellie, and how's the well treating you?

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He said in his genial way,
And Ellie Henderson, getting nervous and flushing

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and feeling that it was extraordinarily nice
of him to come and talk to her,

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said that many people really felt the
heat more than the cold. Yes

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they do, said Richard Dollaway.
Yes, but what more did one say?

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Hullo? Richard said, somebody taking
him by the elbow, And good

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lord, there was old Peter,
Old Peter Walsh, who was delighted to

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see him. Ever so pleased to
see him, he had changed a bit,

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and off they went together, walking
right across the room, giving each

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other little pats, as if they
hadn't met for a long time. Ellie

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Henderson thought, watching them go,
certain she knew that man's face, a

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tall man, middle aged, rather
fine eyes, dark wearing spectacles, with

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a look of John Burrow's. Edith
would be sure to know. The curtain,

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with its flight of birds of paradise, blew out again, and Glarissa

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saw, she saw Ralph Lyon beat
it back and go on talking. So

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it wasn't a failure after all.
It was going to be all right now

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her party, it had begun,
it had started, but it was still

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touch and go. She must stand
there for the present. People seemed to

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come in a rush. Colonel and
Missus Garrett, mister Hugh Whitbred, mister

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Bowley, Missus Hillbury, Lady Mary
Maddox, mister quinn intoned Wilken. She

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had six or seven words with each, and they went on, They went

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into the rooms into something now not
nothing, since Ralph Lyon had beat back

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the car. And yet for her
own part, it was too much of

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an effort. She was not enjoying
it. It was too much like being

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just anybody standing there. Anybody could
do it. Yet this, anybody,

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she did a little admire, couldn't
help feeling that she had anyhow made this

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happen, that it marked a stage
this post that she felt herself to have

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become for Oddly enough, she had
quite forgotten what she looked like, but

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she felt herself a stake driven in
at the top of her stairs. Every

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time she gave a party, she
had this feeling of being something not herself,

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and that everyone was unreal in one
way, much more real than another.

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It was, she thought, partly
their clothes, partly being taken out

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of their ordinary ways, partly the
background. It was possible to say things

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you couldn't say anyhow else, things
that needed an effort, possible to go

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much deeper, but not for her, not yet anyhow. How delightful to

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see you, she said, dear
old sir Harry. He would know everyone.

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And what was so odd about it
was the sense had as they came

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up the stairs, one after another, Missus Mount and Celia Herbert Ainstein,

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Missus Dakers, oh, and Lady
Bruton. How awfully good of you to

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come, she said, and she
meant it. It was odd house.

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Standing there, one felt them going
on going on, some quite old some

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what name Lady Rossiter? But who
on earth was Lady Rossiter? Clarissa?

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That voice it was Sally's seton Sallie
seton after all these years, she loomed

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through a mist, for she hadn't
looked like that. Sally seton when Clarissa

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grasped the hot water can, to
think of her under this roof, under

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this roof, not like that,
All on top of each other, embarrassed,

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laughing words tumbled out, passing through
London, heard from Clara Hayden,

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what a chance of seeing you?
So I thrust myself in without an invitation,

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one might put down the hot water
can. Quite composedly. The luster

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had gone out of her, yet
it was extraordinary to see her again,

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older, happier, less lovely.
They kissed each other, first this cheek,

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then that, and Clarissa turned with
Sally's hand in hers, and saw

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her rooms full, heard the roar
of voices, saw the candlesticks, the

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blowing curtains, and the roses which
Richard had given her. I have five

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enormous boys, said Sally. She
had the simplest egotism and most open desire

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to be thought first always, And
Clorisa loved her for being still like that.

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I can't believe it, she cried, kindling all over with pleasure at

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the thought of the past. But
alas Wilkins. Wilkins wanted her. Wilkins

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was emitting in a voice of commanding
authority, as if the whole company must

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be admonished and the hostess reclaimed from
frivolity. One name, the Prime Minister,

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said, Peter Walsh, the Prime
Minister. Was it really? Ellie

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Henderson marveled? What a thing to
tell Edith. One couldn't laugh at him.

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He looked so ordinary you might have
stood him behind a counter and bought

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biscuits. Poor chap all rigged up
in gold lace. And as he went

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his rounds, first with Clarissa,
then with Richard escorting him, he did

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it very well. He tried to
look somebody. It was amusing to watch.

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Nobody looked at him. They just
went on talking. Yet it was

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perfectly plain that they all knew fell
to the marrow of their bones, this

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majesty passing, this symbol of what
they all stood for English society. Old

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lady Bruton, and she looked very
fine, too, very stalwart in her

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lace. Swam up and they withdrew
into a little room, which at once

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became spied upon, guarded, and
a sort of stir and Russell rippled through

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every one openly the Prime Minister,
Lord Lord, the snobbery of the English,

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thought Peter Walsh standing in the corner, How they loved dressing up in

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gold lace and doing homage there.
That must be by Jove, it was

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Hugh Whitbred's snuffing round the precincts of
the great grown rather fatter, rather whiter,

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the admirable Hue. He looked always
as if he were on duty,

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thought Peter, a privileged but seek
being, hoarding secrets which he would die

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to defend, though it was only
some little piece of tittle tattle dropped by

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a court footman, which would be
in all the papers tomorrow. Such were

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his rattles, his baubles in playing
with which he had grown white, come

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to the verge of old age,
enjoying the respect and affection of all who

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had the privilege of knowing this type
of the English public school man. Inevitably

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one made up things like that about
Hugh. That was his style, the

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style of those admirable letters which Peter
had read thousands of miles across the sea

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in the times. And to thank
God he was out of that pernicious hubble

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bubble. If it were only to
hear baboons, chatter and coolies beat their

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wives. An olive skinned youth from
one of the universities stood obsequiously by him.

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He would patronize, initiate, teach
how to get on, for he

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liked nothing better than doing kindnesses,
making the hearts of old ladies palpetit with

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the joy of being thought of in
their age their affliction, thinking themselves quite

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forgotten. Yet here was dear Hugh, driving up and spending an hour talking

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of the asked, remembering trifles,
praising the homemade cake. Though Hugh might

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eat cake with a duchess any day
of his life, and to look at

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him probably did spend a good deal
of time in that agreeable occupation. The

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all judging, the all merciful might
excuse Peter Walsh had no mercy villains there

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must be, and God knows the
rascals who get hanged for battering the brains

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of a girl out in a train
do less harm on the whole than Hugh

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Whitbred and his kindness. Look at
him now on tiptoe, dancing forward,

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bowing and scraping, as the Prime
Minister and Lady Bruton emerged, intimating for

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all the world to see that he
was privileged to say something something private to

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Lady Bruton. As she passed,
she stopped. She wagged her fine old

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head. She was thanking him,
presumably for some piece of civility. She

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had her toadies, minor officials and
government offices who ran about putting through little

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jobs on her behalf, in return
for which she gave him luncheon. But

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she derived from the eighteenth century.
She was all right, And now Clarissa

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is esquorted her prime Minister down the
room, prancing, sparkling with the stateliness

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of her gray hair. She wore
ear rings and a silver green mermaid's dress,

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lollaping on the waves and braiding her
tresses. She seemed, having that

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gift still to be to exist,
to sum it all up in the moment.

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As she passed, turned, caught
her scarf in some other woman's dress,

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unhitched, it laughed, all with
the most perfect ease and air of

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creature floating in its element. But
age had brushed her, even as a

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mermaid might behold in her glass the
setting sun on some very clear evening over

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the waves, there was a breath
of tenderness, her severity, her prudery,

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her woodenness, were all warmed through
now, and she had about her

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as she said goodbye to the thick, gold laced man, who was doing

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his best, and good luck to
him to look important, an inexpressible dignity,

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an exquisite cordiality, as if she
wished the whole world well, and

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must, now, being on the
very verge and rim of things, take

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her leave. So she made him
think, but he was not in love.

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End of section twenty seven, read
by Hannah Dorma, London, twenty

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fourth October twenty twenty one,