Tea & Antipathy (19 page)

I thought of this as we shared tea with the Bilkington family. Stephanie Bilkington was fifteen, Mark's age. She was a shy, slender, very pretty child in a severe suit and heavy brown oxfords. Her hair was parted on the side; she wore it the way Princess Elizabeth had worn her hair at the age of ten, and tried unsuccessfully to hide behind it.

“Oh, Mummy,” she said, “today the Geography Mistress was talking about the yacht
Brittania.
One of the girls said it was expensive to run it just to take the Queen to Scotland. The mistress said it wasn't such a great expense; after all, it is the Queen.”

Mrs. Bilkington set her cup down with a majestic gesture and turned partway in her chair to face Stephanie, who tried to shrink back behind her hair.

“What your mistress should have told you,” Mrs. Bilkington said, addressing us all, “what your Geography Mistress should have told you, Stephanie, is that the
Brittania
is a hospital ship. It must be maintained in any case because it is a hospital ship, vital in time of war. The Queen's taking it to Scotland is incidental; it costs nothing extra.”

“Oh, Mummy,” Stephanie said faintly, “I wish I'd known.”

“You should have known,” Mrs. Bilkington said kindly, “but you may tell your little friend.”

“Oh, thank you, Mummy,” Stephanie said.

“I have a friend,” Mrs. Bilkington said to us, “who travelled with the Queen and the Duke at one time on their ship. She travelled with them on the same ship. She told me that Philip likes to call her Betty.” She paused. “Yes,” she said,” he calls her Betty. I know it's true because I happened to be sitting quite
near them at a polo match and I heard him call her Betty. I think he said, ‘Oh, Betty, hand me my sweater,' or something like that.”

“Oh, Mummy,” Stephanie said.

Rodney and William sat side by side in little gray wool shorts with matching jackets. Rodney was nine, only a year younger than Bruce, but about half his size. He had enormous frightened eyes in a thin face; his little legs stuck out of his shorts like matchsticks. William, six, was also rather under-sized, but he had a rosy complexion and seemed fairly outgoing. “It's time for
Stingray
,” he said.

“Oh,
Stingray
,” Mr. Bilkington said. He had been quietly dozing on a fat red sofa that matched the two fat red armchairs. “Oh, I never miss
Stingray
.” He looked at his wife. “I suppose it's all right if I just watch it,” he said.

“Yes, go along,” she said indulgently. “Rodney,” Rodney shot up, a look of terror on his face. “Just take your guests into the playroom,” his mother told him. He herded Eric and Bruce off with him and Mr. Bilkington and William.

“
I
don't like it,” Stephanie said. “It's all fighting, you know. For boys.”

“I don't know what to do about Rodney,” Mrs. Bilkington said. “He seems rather unsure of himself.”

“He seems shy,” Jordan said.

“Well, he is rather shy. So we are going to try sending him off to boarding school in the autumn. Perhaps that will bring him out of himself.”

“Oh, Rodney's awful,” Stephanie said, giggling and looking at Mark from behind her hair. “He teases me.”

“I've spoken to the doctor about it,” Mrs. Bilkington went on, “but there doesn't seem to be a detectable reason for his hesitant attitude.”

“Oh, Doctor Killman,” Stephanie said shyly.

“Stephanie loves Doctor Killman,” Mrs. Bilkington explained. “He's our doctor.”

“We could use a good doctor,” Jordan said, obviously thinking of Dr. Bott. “We don't have one at the moment.”

“Oh, Doctor Killman is excellent,” Mrs. Bilkington said. “We have used him for years, he couldn't be better. Of course,” she added, “he's Jewish.” She paused a moment to let that sink in. “Now I realize,” she went on, “that many people will not use a Jewish doctor because they feel he will refer them to other Jewish doctors if they need special treatment or anything of that kind. We were hesitant ourselves about it. But I may say with confidence that Doctor Killman will not recommend another doctor unless it's necessary and not unless he is a good one, Jewish or otherwise.”

“That's good,” Jordan said.

“Yes, many people hesitate to use Jewish doctors,” Mrs. Bilkington said.

“I love Doctor Killman,” Stephanie remarked.

“I'll give you his name,” Mrs. Bilkington said to Jordan. “You can feel absolutely confident about him.”

“I wish you could come up with something for the children to do every day,” I said, whining as usual. “We have an awful time, especially in bad weather.”

“Children love Madame Tussaud's,” she said. “Have you taken them there?”

“Well, actually,” I said, “Eric was frightened to death by it. He was frightened of the Hamlet diorama, and he was terrified of the Queen Mother.”

“The Queen Mum!”

“Yes, it's weird, isn't it? The thing's got a funny look in its eyes.”

“Frightened of the Queen Mum!” Mrs. Bilkington couldn't get over it. “That's really amusing, you know, and the Queen Mum would be the first to laugh at it, because she has an absolutely marvelous sense of humor. And she has a twinkle in her eye. I suppose they tried to catch that in the wax figure….”

“It sort of leers,” I said.

“Yes, they tried to catch that twinkle. Everyone knows, you see, that the Queen Mum has a twinkle in her eye. She's known for it. She goes about everywhere, you see, and everyone loves to see her, because she cheers them up. She's such a happy person. And she would laugh at Eric, you know, because she's the first to get a joke. Everyone always says that. Actually, I've seen her, and she really is a very jolly person. She really does have a twinkle in her eye.” Mrs. Bilkington laughed reminiscently. “The Queen Mum,” she said, subsiding.

I didn't have to look at Jordan, who sat beside me in a wing chair; I could tell from his gentle breathing that he was asleep.

“Speaking of the Royal Family,” Mrs. Bilkington said.

“I and my husband,” Stephanie remarked, laughing. Mark looked at her.

“Yes,” Mrs. Bilkington said, “she always used to say, ‘I and my husband' and of course her voice is rather high. Now she's changed it a little to avoid being laughed at. She says, ‘My husband and I.'”

“I and my husband,” Stephanie said, in a high voice.

“Now she says, ‘My husband and I.' She tries to vary it,” Mrs. Bilkington explained. “Speaking of the Royal Family, I must just show you the rest of the photographs I took last month. I was standing quite close to everything, I had a wonderful place, really. I wrote away for it a year ago.”

She rose and went to rummage in a drawer.

“What do you think of the Beatles?” Mark asked Stephanie, tensely.

“Oh, I really prefer Bing Crosby,” Stephanie replied. “Don't you?”

“Here they are,” Mrs. Bilkington said. “Now here's the first. His name probably won't mean anything to you, but this man is the Queen's Secretary. I caught him standing in this window, he was right above us. I just happened to look up.”

“My goodness,” I said loudly, clearing my throat. “Look at this.” I handed the photograph to Jordan, poking him with my elbow to wake him up. Mrs. Bilkington had taken quite a lot of photographs. I looked at them and passed them to Jordan who looked at them and passed them on to Mark.

“Ha ha,” Mark said. “The Queen looks funny in this blue bathrobe.”

My heart missed a beat. There was a frozen silence before Mrs. Bilkington spoke calmly. “Those are official robes actually,” she said. “It's traditional to wear them.”

The boys and Mr. Bilkington came back from viewing
Stingray
.

“It was awfully good this time,” Mr. Bilkington said. “They were trapped on a forbidden planet.”

Eventually we thanked the Bilkingtons for their hospitality, and straggled back to the station. We explained to Mark at some length that he shouldn't have laughed at the Queen. After a while the train came, and we boarded, stuffed with sweets, tired and very crabby. We arrived at Marylebone Station in a sullen silence and emerged into the eerie stillness of the Sunday London streets. We couldn't even think of dinner until well after ten o'clock.

M
ARGARET LEECH
had invited us to spend Sunday afternoon at her apartment so that Bruce and Eric could play with her son Michael. We felt sympathetic toward Michael because of the pleasure everyone seemed to take in his humiliation after he called a passerby a twit, and because of his projected banishment to an English boarding school: an institution which my reading on the subject led me to consider as a cross between an army camp and a federal penitentiary, with a lot of Latin thrown in.

We took a cab through the deadly silent streets. Nothing stirred, not even a cat. “At least we don't have to take a train,” Jordan said. When we got out of the cab, we encountered Maud Tweak, slim in very tight Levis and a silk pink blouse, carrying a string bag filled with goodies. She scooped us up and led us upstairs to the flat. Michael, a smallish child with big dark eyes, was waiting in the hall. He threw his arms around Eric's neck and they went off chummily to an inner room, Bruce and Mark trailing.

The roomy flat had matching Swedish modern furniture and wallpaper with ivy and trellises on it. There was a large window offering a view of the gloomy gray Sunday sky. Margaret served us wine—apparently tea was considered to be middle class or something by whatever caste Maud Tweak and
Margaret Leech belonged to. They turned their noses up at the very mention of the stuff.

“I'm glad you wore slacks,” Maud said, glancing at my blue madras pants. ‘They're regulation Sunday attire around here.” Again I had fortunately chosen the correct uniform, although madras may have been a little over the edge. My conformist American instincts might have been in play here. The British press wrote a lot about American conformism.

“You'll like the people who are coming today,” Maud Tweak said to us. ‘They're Jewish.” She went on, after a pause, her eyes snapping with malice. “Such an interesting party you had the other night. Who
was
that fascinating woman in the floppy green hat?”

“Daisy Goldbrick,” I said. “You seemed so friendly, I thought you had met her before.”

“Never laid eyes on the woman. But she
did
fasten onto me, didn't she?”

The doorbell rang, and Albert entered, dressed sportily and reeking of garlic as usual. “I was just talking about the Millers' party,” Maud told him. “Such interesting people. And of course I took the What's-Their-Name around afterward. I showed them Fleet Street at night. I think they loved it.”

“Are your friends American?” Albert asked politely.

“He is,” I said, but Nini's—”

“Dutch-French,” Maud said. “With a strong dash of American.”

“I liked your husband,” I said to Maud.

“Oh, did you? Yes, I daresay he seems very nice on first meeting.”

The doorbell rang again, and a very fat blonde woman with an enormous nose came in, and lay down full length on the
floor. She was wearing slacks too, and carrying a velvet handbag. “Don't say a word,” she said. “I have to do this for my back. It's the only way it's comfortable.”

“Poor dear,” Maud said. “Your poor back. Have you had an awful time?”

“I threw her out,” the woman said. “I told her to get out.”

“Her
au pair
girl,” Margaret said to me. “I have one too. You know, they come here to learn English. Usually from Italy. They're all impossible.”

“Threw her out,” the fat woman said.

“This is Anastasia Silverman,” Margaret said. We all murmured how do you do. Margaret asked her, “What happened to Gregory?”

“He had to go out,” she responded cryptically. “But I brought George.”

A small blond boy darted around the room with Michael in hot pursuit. I assumed this was George.

“I'm interested that you liked Hugh,” Maud Tweak said to me. “So many people do when they first meet him. Of course he's very charming to strangers. But you know he didn't say a word to me all the way home.”

“Is that so,” I said.

Mark came into the room. “They're killing Bruce and Eric,” he remarked.

Nobody moved, except me. I rose and followed Mark down the hall to a small bedroom where Michael and George were wrestling on an enormous bed. Bruce and Eric were standing in a corner, staring at them. “You'd better be careful,” I said, to Michael and George.

George reached down on the floor and picked up a shoe. He threw it and hit Mark in the head.

“Hey! “Mark said.

Michael laughed hoarsely. “Good for you,” he said. He slid off the bed and lunged at Eric, who slipped behind Bruce. Michael kicked Bruce in the shins. “Ow,” Bruce said. George laughed and jumped on Michael's back. They began to roll over the floor, kicking out very hard at everyone. “Listen here,” I said.

“What's the matter with these brats?” Mark asked.

“I think they're both disturbed,” Bruce observed. “They've got problems.”

“Let's go home,” Eric said.

This was a sensible suggestion, but instead I went into the living room and said brightly, “My goodness, they certainly are lively children. I'm afraid my kids can't cope with them.”

Anastasia, who was now sitting on the Swedish modem sofa, stared at me coldly.

“They seem to be fighting,” I said, sitting down on the matching chair.

“Boys always fight,” Maud Tweak said. “I helped with Michael's birthday party. They were rolling all over the floors. Breaking things. I was simply exhausted.”