Ways and Means (17 page)
‘I don’t suppose they’ll stay any longer than the last people,’ the Vicar said to his wife, ‘but I’d better go and see them.’ He was very pleasantly surprised with his visit. Never in his time had any people arrived at Sutcliffe Bowling who seemed so anxious to bring in more than they wanted to take out. And they appeared wealthy, too.
‘You want a new village hall, Vicar,’ said Basil. ‘Could you get a licence?’
‘I expect we could get a licence,’ said the Vicar. ‘But it takes more than a licence to put up a village hall.’
Six months later the affairs of Sutcliffe Bowling were in the process of transformation. The quartet had come there to start families, but they soon found that there was plenty of other interesting work to be done. The setting upon its feet of a half-moribund community quickly appealed to Basil and Nicholas as a job worth doing. It was fun to see such immediate results. Even Major Brain, who was now starting to spend more time in the big house than in his own, did not worry them. Indeed, they found it an interesting question to decide how to launch him again on the world. Finding that he was quite clever with his hands, they eventually set him up as a jobbing carpenter. He was delighted and soon became able to earn the price of a pint or (on a hot day) even a quart. The Vicarage itself started to take on a different air. Elizabeth went to see the Bishop and arranged for the house to be repaired without the Vicar knowing who was paying for it. Just as they had been amused in the past at the antics of the people who provided them with the means of livelihood, so now they enjoyed watching the little people round them being reborn as a result of their help.
One day the Vicar and Basil were chatting.
‘It’s such an attractive name — Sutcliffe Bowling,’ Basil said.
‘Yes, it is a pleasant name for a village — but I’m bound to admit that, until you four came here, there wasn’t much else pleasant about it. It’s horrible to watch people going downhill and to know that the help one is giving is wholly insufficient. You ought to be very happy people.’
‘We are, Vicar,’ said Basil. ‘Very. In fact, we always have been. Even when things weren’t so good with us, we always found ways and means of getting along.’
‘If one may judge from your behaviour here, you have certainly deserved your success. You must have led almost exemplary lives.’
‘Well, we’ve managed to keep out of prison.’
‘It must have been a close thing sometimes,’ said the Vicar, smiling at his little joke.
‘Sometimes,’ said Basil, smiling too.
WHEN THE GREEN WOODS LAUGH
H. E. Bates
1975
‘There!’ Pop said . . . ‘There’s the house. There’s Gore Court for you. What about that, eh? Better than St Paul’s, ain’t it, better than St Paul’s?’
Nevertheless Pop could bring himself to part with the noble pile of junk for a song — to the tune of £10,000 profit. And if Mr Jerebohm, the Piccadilly farmer, imagined the Kentish yokels were dim, he was at liberty to do so. But the up-stage city wives were not at liberty to bring charges of indecent assault against Pop. He showed them why . . . in court.
In the last of the Larkin trilogy H. E. Bates makes the Dragon’s Blood and the double scotches hit with no less impact than they did in
The Darling Buds of May
. For the full Larkin orchestra is back on the rural fiddle, and (with Angela Snow around) the Brigadier may be too old to ride but he’s young enough to fall.
‘Pa is as sexy, genial, generous, and boozy as ever. Ma is a worthy match for him in all these qualities’ —
The Times
Also available:
THE DARLING BUDS OF MAY . 1602
A BREATH OF FRENCH AIR . 1685
NOT FOR SALE IN THE U.S.A.
DON’T TELL ALFRED
Nancy Mitford
1976
‘Miss Mitford at her wittiest and gayest and . . . most audacious’ —
Scotsman
Cracks in the upper crust are almost Nancy Mitford’s private literary domain. She scribbles moustaches on to the family portraits with the irresistible glee of an urchin.
Many of the characters in her latest novel need no introduction to the thousands of admirers of
The Pursuit of Love
and
Love in a Cold Climate
. The scene is Paris, where Alfred (the husband of Fanny, who is once again the narrator) has been posted as Ambassador. Nancy Mitford is on the top of her sparkling form as she describes the effect on Parisian society not only of such old favourites as Uncle Davey and the Bolter, but of a younger generation who will undoubtedly become equally well loved. We might mention particularly the exquisite Northey (Fanny’s social secretary and latter-day Zuleika Dobson), Fanny’s own children (problems, one and all), and — but no, there are too many. Read, and be enchanted in your turn.
‘Delicious imbroglio’ —
Daily Telegraph
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MY OEDIPUS COMPLEX
AND OTHER STORIES
Frank O’Connor
1956
W. B. Yeats once declared that ‘O’Connor is doing for Ireland what Chekhov did for Russia’. A patriotic boast, perhaps, but it doesn’t take an Irishman to recognize the unpredictable liveliness and observant sympathy in these eighteen short stories. Their insight into Irish character and life never slides into sentimentality. Ranging from a child’s confident misconceptions about sex to Sam Higgins, the honest headmaster, driven to exasperation and near madness by his slick and cynical rival, they are written with a freshness and fluency that is indeed Irish, but their appeal is world-wide.
‘Frank O’Connor has long been recognized as one of the great shortstory writers of this century’ —
Time and Tide
‘Nowhere will you get so vivid, humorous, and deeply understanding a picture of Ireland as in these tales. . . . Anyone can enjoy his stories. All start with a bang and carry one through breathless to the end’ —
Daily Telegraph
‘A miraculous technique which universalizes the stories without impairing their local virtue’ — Muriel Spark in the
Observer
NOT FOR SALE IN THE U.S.A. or CANADA
ON THE LOOSE
John Stroud
1974
Old enough to want to run away from a loveless home, but too young to know where to go, Royston Beedman is a small boy on the loose. Royston is the wretched result of an adoption gone wrong — gone wrong because his well-to-do ‘parents’ thought that bringing up a child consists in paying school fees and buying expensive presents. He cuts a tragi-comic figure as his rebellious jaunts force him to spend cold nights huddled in beach huts or railway trucks. Driven to petty crime, he becomes ‘a social problem’, as well-intentioned but over-worked officialdom does its best to take over where the home failed.
The same warmth and humour mark this story as The Shorn Lamb, in which John Stroud retailed the experiences of a Child Care Officer — experiences which allow the writer to inject a feeling of real life into his novels.
‘Beautifully done . . . the stress and tension are kept up excitingly throughout’ —
Sunday Times
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MY FRIEND JUDAS
Andrew Sinclair
1980
‘I’ve seen every steady affair I know bust up round this time. Joes and totties loving each other the whole year through, and suddenly spitting in each other’s eye this week. Pills taking every chance to tread on their best friend’s faces. All so goddam neurotic. If May Week’s meant to be a rest-period after Tripos, give me Piccadilly Circus at midday any old time.’
For Ben Birt, a self-confessed parasite, May Week marks the end of an era. He has finished his exams. His girl has finished with him. And as Ben mournfully looks forward to two years of National Service, and back over three years at Cambridge doing everything but set-work and sport, Andrew Sinclair, author of
The Breaking of Bumbo
, explodes once and for all the myths about all those hallowed seats of learning.
‘Very clever indeed. . . . This portrait of
la vie de bohème universitaire
should raise squeals of outraged delight . . . all along the line from Belgravia to Budleigh Salterton’ — Peter Green in the
Daily Telegraph
‘A brilliantly readable comedy with an edge of bitterness . . . showing a very talented young novelist in the act of extending his range’ — J. D. Scott in the
Sunday Times
NOT FOR SALE IN THE U.S.A.
HENRY CECIL
Henry Cecil does for the law what Richard Gordon has so successfully done for the medical profession. Among his brilliantly funny novels, of which eight are now available in Penguins, are:
Brothers in Law . 1745
Introducing the immeasurably young and ignorant Roger Thursby, who has just been called to the bar.
Friends at Court . 1746
‘Cecil better than ever’ was P .G. Wodehouse’s comment on this story of Roger Thursby, now on the point of taking silk.
Much in Evidence . 1747
The law courts tend to get completely out of hand in this ‘further instalment of fun and frolic at Bar, Bench, and Solicitor’s office’ —
Spectator
Sober as a Judge . 1748
Roger Thursby is now a judge, and an array of entertaining and sometimes lethal characters now beset his sober path.
Settled Out of Court . 1990
In the story of a financier convicted of murder on perjured evidence, the author ‘continues to do superbly what everyone now knows he can do well’ —
Sunday Times
Daughters in Law . 1991
The hilarious experiences of twin sisters in the law make a novel which is as entertaining and readable as
Brothers in Law
.
Alibi for a Judge . 1992
The case of the judge who had pangs of conscience. ‘Improbabilities so imperturbably and amusingly put can only be enjoyed’ —
Solicitor’s journal
Independent Witness
His latest novel. ‘Mr Henry Cecil’s comedies of criminal life are ingenious, sprightly, immensely amusing from page to page’ — Julian Symons in the
Sunday Times
. Independent Witness is published by Michael Joseph Ltd, 26 Bloomsbury Street, London wc1.
NOT FOR SALE IN THE U.S.A.
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