Christmas at High Rising: A Virago Modern Classic (VMC) Read online

  ‘Well, my boy,’ said George Knox as the curtain fell for the second interval. ‘And how do you like it?’

  ‘It’s fairly decent, sir,’ said Tony kindly. ‘I should think the princess is quite about twenty-five, but she looks quite young. I don’t think much of the band, do you, sir? It’s —’

  Here he broke off and turned to his mother. His face was alight with enthusiasm and his voice had lost all its world-weariness as he pulled his mother by her dress, exclaiming in a loud voice, ‘Oh, Mother, who do you think I’ve seen?’

  ‘The Prince of Wales?’ said Laura, looking wildly round.

  ‘Mother! I mean really important. Look, Mother, over there in the dress circle. It’s old Donk. Mother, do you think he can see me? What will he think when he sees me in a box, Mother? Can I go and talk to him? Mother, he hasn’t seen me yet. I’ll hypnotise him to make him see me.’

  ‘You can’t,’ said Dora. ‘Hypnotism’s all rubbish. Daddy said so.’

  ‘I bet you I can,’ said Tony, and hanging over the edge of the box in a way which caused his mother’s heart to palpitate with anxiety, he made various cabalistic signs, which if they did not succeed in hypnotising Master Wesendonck to look, at least attracted the attention of the greater part of the audience.

  ‘Tony! Don’t lean over like that,’ said his agonised mother. ‘You’ll fall into the orchestra and be killed.’

  But before this misfortune could occur, Master Wesendonck’s eye had been caught. Tony gave a gasp of relief and sank back into his chair, from which he waved a languid hand at his friend, followed by various grimaces which evidently alluded to school jokes and were taken in excellent part by his fellow-pupil. All too soon the curtain rose again for the last act, but Tony’s spirits were now completely restored. Delicious high-pitched laughter broke uncontrollably from him at intervals. When the Widow Twankey became entangled in the clothes-horse and the mangle, he rocked backwards and forwards in an ecstasy of joy, kicking the front of the box with his shoes and making the legs of his chair bump on the ground with the vehemence of his pleasure. Wrapt in a romantic trance, drunk with the Widow and overjoyed by the presence of his friend among the audience, he was impervious to the tweaks and hushes from his elders. By the time the performance ended, all three grown-ups were cross and exhausted, but Tony rose radiant from his seat.

  ‘Jolly good performance,’ he said kindly to his host. ‘Mother, did you hear me laughing at the funny parts? I have a good kind of laugh and I expect the actors liked it. I wonder if Donk heard me, Mother. Mr Knox, can we wait at the door and see if we can see Donk?’

  Laura gave no encouragement to this plan, but by the greatest good luck as they stood waiting for George Knox’s car, Master Wesendonck, supported by a mother and sisters, hove in sight.

  ‘Hullo, Donk,’ said Tony in a loud voice. ‘Pretty rotten show, wasn’t it, but I laughed at some of the bits. Did you hear me laughing? I was in a box.’

  Master Wesendonck nodded silently and passed on.

  ‘Good old Donk,’ said Tony contentedly. ‘He enjoyed the pantomime awfully. I expect he’ll tell the other chaps he saw me in a box with my trouser suit on. Do you think he noticed my trouser suit, Mother?’

  But his mother hurled him into the car.

  The drive home was George Knox’s opportunity, and he delivered himself upon every topic of the day with violence and fluency, while Tony, who normally would have given his valueless views, sat in a dream. When they got to High Rising, George Knox got out first.

  ‘Good God, Laura,’ he said, anxiously fumbling about for the switch that turned on the inside lights. ‘I have trodden on something human.’

  He found the switch and light flooded the car. On the floor of the car lay a horrible dark-looking mess with pieces of something white sticking to it.

  ‘Oh Mother, it’s my mince-pie,’ said Tony indignantly.

  ‘What on earth did you want any more mince-pies for?’ asked his exhausted mother.

  ‘Mother, I didn’t. It was for Rose, She couldn’t have a treat, so I saved my other mince-pie for her and I had it in my school cap, but it must have fallen out.’

  ‘Never mind, Tony,’ said Dora, also in harmony with all the world. ‘I won’t tell Rose, and then she won’t know.’

  ‘Right-oh,’ said Tony, ‘then I’ll eat it myself,’ and scooping the mangled mince-pie off the floor, he put it all into his mouth.

  ‘Thanks awfully, sir,’ he said to George Knox, his articulation much impeded by the squashed pie. ‘It was a ripping show and it was frightful luck to see old Donk.’

  And then he followed his mother into the house.

  First published in Harper’s Bazaar, February 1935

  Christmas at Mulberry Lodge

  William was six and Mary was about eight. They lived in London (which Mary knew was the capital of England but William was too little to know about capitals) in a very nice house with a garden, and it was so long ago that Queen Victoria was still reigning over England. Their nursery was up three pairs of stairs and there was a gate on the landing to keep them from coming down unless Nannie was with them or their mother sent for them. William boasted a great deal to Mary about how he would undo the gate and go downstairs when Nannie wasn’t looking, but as a matter of fact he couldn’t undo it at all because the latch was on the other side. Mary could easily reach over and undo it, but though she boasted a good deal to William about this, she never really did it because Nannie might have found out. Nannie was a rather sharp-nosed person, not very tall, but William and Mary thought her taller and more important than anyone in the world. If their mother told them to do anything, or not to do anything, they said, ‘Oh Mother, need I?’ But if Nannie gave an order they obeyed it at once. It was not that Nannie was unkind, but she knew exactly what was right and what was wrong for young ladies and gentlemen, and had a cousin called Albert who was a soldier and had once been allowed to come to tea in the nursery in a red coat before he went back to India. Besides these great advantages, Nannie said she had an eye in the back of her head that told her what William and Mary were doing when she had her back turned. William sometimes screamed after he had gone to bed because he said Nannie’s eye was on the ceiling. Mary told him not to be so silly, but she really knew in the bottom of her heart that the reason Nannie wore high, stiff collars was so that no one should see where the eye lived. Otherwise, Nannie was very nice and used to sing hymns after tea by the nursery fire, before the gas was lighted, which gave the children a lovely sad feeling.

  Every Christmas, William and Mary and Nannie with Mr and Mrs Mulberry (which was the name of the children’s father and mother) went to the seaside where the old Mr and Mrs Mulberry lived, who were William and Mary’s grandfather and grandmother. Old Mr and Mrs Mulberry had a large white house on the village green and two large prancing horses that came to the station with a carriage and a coachman and brought the whole family from the train to Mulberry Lodge, which was curiously enough the name of the house. William said it ought to be called Mulberry Bush, because of ‘Here we go round the Mulberry Bush’, and Mary said, ‘Silly.’ So William banged his toy drum and said, ‘Mulberry Bush, Mulberry Bush,’ again and again, and Mary got onto the rocking horse and rocked backwards and forwards shouting, ‘Silly Billy, Silly Billy,’ and the noise was quite dreadful, when suddenly Nannie, who had been down to the kitchen to get the milk and the butter for nursery tea, came into the room with them on a tray and said that was quite enough.

  ‘But, Nannie,’ said William, ‘she said Silly Billy.’

  ‘How often have I told you not to say “she”,’ said Nannie, putting the tray down. ‘“She” is the cat’s grandmother, and don’t let me have to tell you again and run along in the night nursery and wash your hands and put that drum away in the toy-cupboard at once.’

  Mary was so pleased that she pointed at William and said a dreadful word, which was ‘Idiot’. But Nannie, talking in a horrid voice and saying it all in one breat
h said How often had she told Miss Mary young ladies never pointed and if she said words like that to her brother she would have to tell her mother of her and to get down off the rocking horse at once and go and wash her hands for tea and if she hadn’t dirtied her clean pinafore already and how all the packing was to be finished in time to go to Mulberry Lodge next day she couldn’t think and if they made all that noise she couldn’t ever get their stockings packed and then Father Christmas wouldn’t give them any presents.

  This was such a dreadful thought that William and Mary became perfectly quiet and ate their bread and butter, and their bread and jam (without butter), and two small rock cakes and a thick slice of chocolate cake each and said their grace and asked if they might get down. Then they washed their hands again, and William had his clean smock and Mary had a clean pinafore and they went down to the drawing-room to their mother. And Nannie packed and packed; and after they were in bed she packed and packed; and next morning, which was Christmas Eve, she packed and packed, till the whole family got into a four-wheeled cab drawn by a bony horse and went off to the station. And at about half-past twelve they got to the seaside and the two prancing horses with the carriage and the coachmen met them at the train and took them to Mulberry Lodge.

  Now, the nursery at Mulberry Lodge was not very big, so Nannie and the children often had tea in the kitchen for a treat, and after tea Nannie had long conversations with Florence the parlour-maid about a cousin of Florence’s who was in hospital and the children were allowed to go into the drawing-room till their bedtimes.

  In the drawing-room they found a large white dust-sheet spread on the floor and on it a great heap of holly and ivy and mistletoe that the gardener had brought in that afternoon. Their father had a stepladder and was putting bits of holly along the tops of all the pictures. Their mother had a box of little nails and a hammer and was fastening ivy all round the door. Grandpapa was tying the mistletoe into bunches and told William to come and help him. Grandmamma had a little broom and a little dust-pan each with a long handle and was going about sweeping up all the leaves and berries that fell on the floor, and she told Mary to get the waste-paper basket and follow her, so that she could empty her little dustpan into it. Everyone worked very hard till half-past six when Nannie knocked at the door and came in.

  ‘Now you must go to bed, darlings,’ said their mother.

  ‘Oh Mother, need we?’ said William and Mary.

  ‘Well, just five more minutes,’ said their father. But Nannie, all in one breath, said She had just taken the bath water up and it was nice and hot and some people were quite excited enough already the sooner in bed the sooner it was day. William looked round for the excited people, but he couldn’t see them anywhere, so he supposed Nannie must be seeing them out of the eye in the back of her head. Mary knew quite well that the sooner you were in bed the sooner it wasn’t day at all, but night. But they both knew Nannie must be obeyed, so they said goodnight to the grown-ups and went upstairs, where Nannie gave them their bath in front of the nursery fire (for very few people had bathrooms when Queen Victoria was still Queen of England), and they each had a biscuit and a cup of warm milk and went to bed.

  Now, every year they hung up their stockings on Christmas Eve, and every year since she was six Mary had tried to keep awake to see Father Christmas, and every year, which was two years, she had gone to sleep just before he came. Now, William used to sleep with Nannie at home, while Mary had a little room leading off their room to herself, but at Mulberry Lodge they slept together and Nannie had a room just across the passage and left her door and their door open all night so that she could hear them if they woke, but she snored so loudly that she could really hear nothing, and when once William and Mary had gone to sleep they never woke till time to get up.

  But Christmas Eve is, as everyone knows, a rather special night, and William and Mary could not go to sleep. First there was the noise of the dressing gong. Then Florence looked in to say goodnight and give them each a ginger biscuit, Only not to tell Nannie. Then there was the dinner gong. By this time, of course, it was the middle of the night and William and Mary felt certain that Father Christmas would come at any moment, and then Mary’s stocking and William’s sock that were hanging so limp and empty at the end of their beds would be full of enchanting and interesting things done up in bright-coloured paper.

  The fire was burning low now, and the gas (for hardly anyone had electric light when Queen Victoria was still Queen of England) was turned down so that they could only see a tiny blue flame.

  ‘I shall stay awake all night,’ said Mary.

  ‘I shall stay awake all night too,’ said William, who mostly copied Mary. But while they were staying awake all night a wonderful thing happened. First the big clock in the hall struck eight, which was later than anyone could imagine, and then very soft lovely music began to creep into the room. This was the waits, who were some of the village men that came round singing carols every year for shillings and sixpences, and every year Grandpapa said the noise was too dreadful and would Florence give them that shilling and tell them to go and sing outside Colonel Brown’s house. And every year Grandmamma said they were doing their best and Florence must ask them into the kitchen and give them some beer and some cold pork-pie. As a matter of fact they were not doing their best, for all they did was to gabble through the carols as fast as possible and bang on the front door so that they could get a shilling and go on to Colonel Brown who sometimes gave them two shillings, and the noise was quite dreadful, but William and Mary in a warm room, with the window shut and their heads almost underneath the bedclothes, thought it was the loveliest noise they had ever heard and so went to sleep.

  And now comes one of the really dreadful parts of the story.

  Mary had been to sleep for hours and hours; in fact so long that the grown-ups had finished dinner and it was nearly nine o’clock, when Mother and Nannie came into the room.

  ‘Shall I turn up the gas, m’m?’ said Nannie.

  ‘No, it might wake them,’ said Mother. ‘Light the candle and don’t let it shine on their faces.’

  So Nannie took a box of matches out of her apron pocket, because she never allowed William and Mary to have matches in their room in case they struck them and set the house on fire, and lighted a candle. And Mary, who was having a dream about her rocking-horse that he could gallop out of the nursery and away into the country, dreamed that she gave him a lump of sugar and he scrunched it up. And the striking of the match was just like the scrunch and she woke up and opened one eye. And just at that moment, Nannie moved the candle so that the light shone right into Mary’s one open eye for a moment, and she opened the other. And what should she see but Mother and Nannie putting little parcels done up in bright-coloured paper into the stockings.

  Now Mary knew in her secret self that Father Christmas wasn’t exactly a real person, but she also knew that she mustn’t say so and that William mustn’t be told because he wasn’t old enough. But to know a thing in your secret self is quite different from seeing Mother and Nannie filling your stockings, and Mary knew she ought to make a noise, or bounce about in bed, so that they would know she was awake and tiptoe away again. But she didn’t. She shut her eyes tight and listened with all her ears, which was a dreadful thing to do.

  Then she heard Nannie say to Mother, ‘What a sweet little round thing, m’m. Won’t it run away?’

  And Mother, who was putting something into Mary’s stocking, said, ‘No, Nannie; it is quite cold.’

  Then Mother put something on the chair by Mary’s bed and went across to William’s bed. Mary could hear her putting crackly paper things into William’s sock and then she went round to the other side of his bed and put something on the chair beside him.

  ‘Does it really go, m’m?’ said Nannie.

  ‘Of course,’ said Mother in a laughing whisper. ‘Their Aunt Isabel sent it.’

  Then Nannie blew the candle out and she and Mother went away.

 
After this, Mary felt so full of naughtiness that she could hardly breathe. Also she wondered and wondered what it was that was cold and couldn’t run away and what it was that really went. And she wondered so hard that she couldn’t go to sleep at all. At least she quite well knew that she lay awake all night, but when she opened her eyes again Nannie was turning the gas up and it was a dark, cold Christmas morning and half-past seven o’clock.

  ‘Happy Christmas!’ said William and Mary at the tops of their voices.

  ‘Happy Christmas, I’m sure!’ said Nannie. ‘Now put on your dressing-gowns and slippers and you can take your stockings into Grandmamma’s room.’

  William and Mary both screamed with pleasure and got up and began to put on their dressing-gowns and slippers. Mary had one arm in her dressing-gown when she saw on the chair by her bed a little cage. It was rather long and not very high and at one end of it was a wooden box with a little round hole in it. Over the hole was a little wooden shutter that could be pulled up and down, so that anyone who lived in the cage could go into the box when the shutter was up, but not when it was down. On the top of the wooden box was a lid with a little hook. Mary unfastened the hook and opened the lid. Inside the box was a charming nest made of hay and dry moss, but there was no one in the nest and no one in the cage.

  ‘I can put my little china owl called Rudolph in the nest,’ said Mary.

  Nannie said Never mind about owls and to run along into Grannie’s room and take the cage and the stocking with her and see what happened.

  Then William who had put one foot into his bedroom slipper suddenly stood as still as a snowman for on the chair by his bed was a little clock, ticking away and saying twenty-five minutes to eight.