DORIS LESSING
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with ajudicious nod : fair enough! - but insisted, clinching the thing,
that marriage needed thinking about, those two were rushing into it,
no good could come of it.
Was this perhaps meant for her and Henry?-Jody was won–
dering, for she saw that Henry's intended marriage with an Ameri–
can was bound to be discussed in these forums of public opinion .
Her presence here was being well-noted: and that Henry had
understood was shown by his coming to stand by her, his glass in
one hand, the other at her elbow. In a moment he went on with
remarks apparently not addressed to anyone in particular, to the ef–
fect that he needed someone to come and mend the roof.
All this went on for a good hour or more, with people coming
and going, but mostly coming: the pub was crammed. When the
four left there were cries of, "See you soon, then," "You'll be back?
See you then!" - from allover the room. Outside they set off with the
wind behind them, this time four abreast, Henry at one end holding
Jody's hand, Angela at the other holding Sebastian's, but Angela
and Henry were telling a story and interrupting each other with
much laughter, about an incident in the village. Some imperial
pumpkin had invaded one garden from the next. The invaded owner
had cut off a slice from a pumpkin big enough for Cinderella's coach,
on the grounds he had never tasted it,
ill
feeling had ensued . ...
They did not go to "the cottage" but to the house where Connie was.
A small crowd of people already sat around a vast wooden table in
another court, a smallish one this time, where the wind was shut out.
A deep yellow sunlight filled it, pulling scent from the white roses
that draped a brick wall. Connie was there, sitting with her friend
Jane. Seen by daylight Connie was a tall slender child with dead
black straight hair- Henry's, and black doe eyes-Angela's, both set
off by the ivory cheeks of her sickness, which had apparently come
on again. Jody (if not Sebastian, for he was probably used to it by
now) suffered the usual shock of seeing intimately known features
appropriated by a stranger. Connie and Jane were making a pair,
isolating themselves against the grownups, who all recognized the
need to allow Connie, allow Jane, to stare out at them with eyes full
of the criticisms bred by their shared confidences, refined by the dis–
dainful fastidiousness of their age .
Jane was the daughter of Briony who managed this estate .
Briony was a strong country woman, middle-aged, with short straw–
colored hair and healthy cheeks, observant blue eyes and muscular
hands gained by all the work that went with fields, woods, gardens,
