Read Online A Summer Bird-Cage by Margaret Drabble - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Margaret Drabble
Ads: Link
isn’t it? Where’s the quotation from?’
‘I made it up,’ I said. ‘I couldn’t find anything I wanted to write on, so I made it up.’
‘Oh,’ she said, dryly, ‘it gets you a long way, that kind of thing, writing essays on human nature, you know. You really find an awful lot out, studying other people’s study-bound conceptions of human nature in your own study, don’t you?’
‘Yes, I think you do,’ I said, crossly. I thought it was rather low of her to start taking it out of me for being academic, when she had been through it all herself. And especially mean at exam time. ‘I think I’m going to write rather a good and original essay, if you really want to know.’
‘I’m sure you are,’ she said. ‘I’m sure it’s all very valuable.’
And I am sure I detected a note of wistfulness and nostalgia in her voice at that moment, a nostalgia that she covered up the moment after with, ‘Really, Sarah, do you always leave your underclothes strewn about the room?’
‘I wasn’t expecting visitors,’ I said, pushing a pair of pants under the bed with one foot. Not that I really minded about them. ‘I haven’t time for all that nonsense.’
‘Come on,’ said John, ‘let’s go.’
‘All right. But if anyone sees us, don’t try claiming any acquaintance with me.’
We got out unobserved, fortunately, and found Stephen’s car parked outside. I must confess that it was more the thought of the car that had lured me away from my books than the prospect of Louise’s company. I adore cars. And it really was a most gloriously sunny day: far too good for Hobbes and the college library.
I was hardly surprised at all to see Louise, although it was the first time she had ever visited me in Oxford since she herself went down two summers before. I knew exactly why she had come to see me. There is something about Oxford in the summer that is so entirely undergraduate and nostalgic and enclosed that a visitor feels compelled to establish some contact with the university world: it sucks people in. Uncles look up nephews they had never meant to visit, and passing girls look up long-forgotten men just for the sake of a ride in a punt or tea in a college garden. Having once arrived in Ox, Louise had inevitably come to see me, partly in order to display Stephen and John to me, and partly in order to display me to Stephen and John. For although I knew Louise wasn’t an admirer of mine, I wasn’t too humble to realize that to these three people from London I had the pure virtue of being the real thing, the real student with a real pile of books and a real gown and a real essay to write. It was my place, Oxford, and I was on my own ground, for the only time in the history of my acquaintance with those three.
It was nearly lunch-time and we drove out to eat somewhere out of Oxford. I wanted to go out of the town, as I so rarely had the chance. I thought we would probably go to a pub, but we ended up in rather an expensive hotel just off the road to Banbury. If there is anything that fills me with as much enthusiasm as cars, it is hotels, so I was transported with quiet and concealed joy. We drank a lot of Pimm’s at the bar, and then went and ate a lot of delicious food: Louise always eats an enormous amount and never puts on an ounce. So do I and neither do I. I noticed one curious thing while we were eating: Stephen never seemed to know what to order, and when his food arrived he messed about with it quite horribly, covering it with salt and pepper and French mustard and olive oil, and never more than half-finished anything. He didn’t drink, either: I remember thinking how dreary it must be, to be stone cold sober when everyone else is pleasantly mellow. The talk was quite pleasant: Louise and John talked about the theatre, Stephen and I talked about books and novelists, and so on. Stephen seemed to admire all the people I admired, except for Kingsley Amis. It annoyed me, as I was sure he liked them
‘I made it up,’ I said. ‘I couldn’t find anything I wanted to write on, so I made it up.’
‘Oh,’ she said, dryly, ‘it gets you a long way, that kind of thing, writing essays on human nature, you know. You really find an awful lot out, studying other people’s study-bound conceptions of human nature in your own study, don’t you?’
‘Yes, I think you do,’ I said, crossly. I thought it was rather low of her to start taking it out of me for being academic, when she had been through it all herself. And especially mean at exam time. ‘I think I’m going to write rather a good and original essay, if you really want to know.’
‘I’m sure you are,’ she said. ‘I’m sure it’s all very valuable.’
And I am sure I detected a note of wistfulness and nostalgia in her voice at that moment, a nostalgia that she covered up the moment after with, ‘Really, Sarah, do you always leave your underclothes strewn about the room?’
‘I wasn’t expecting visitors,’ I said, pushing a pair of pants under the bed with one foot. Not that I really minded about them. ‘I haven’t time for all that nonsense.’
‘Come on,’ said John, ‘let’s go.’
‘All right. But if anyone sees us, don’t try claiming any acquaintance with me.’
We got out unobserved, fortunately, and found Stephen’s car parked outside. I must confess that it was more the thought of the car that had lured me away from my books than the prospect of Louise’s company. I adore cars. And it really was a most gloriously sunny day: far too good for Hobbes and the college library.
I was hardly surprised at all to see Louise, although it was the first time she had ever visited me in Oxford since she herself went down two summers before. I knew exactly why she had come to see me. There is something about Oxford in the summer that is so entirely undergraduate and nostalgic and enclosed that a visitor feels compelled to establish some contact with the university world: it sucks people in. Uncles look up nephews they had never meant to visit, and passing girls look up long-forgotten men just for the sake of a ride in a punt or tea in a college garden. Having once arrived in Ox, Louise had inevitably come to see me, partly in order to display Stephen and John to me, and partly in order to display me to Stephen and John. For although I knew Louise wasn’t an admirer of mine, I wasn’t too humble to realize that to these three people from London I had the pure virtue of being the real thing, the real student with a real pile of books and a real gown and a real essay to write. It was my place, Oxford, and I was on my own ground, for the only time in the history of my acquaintance with those three.
It was nearly lunch-time and we drove out to eat somewhere out of Oxford. I wanted to go out of the town, as I so rarely had the chance. I thought we would probably go to a pub, but we ended up in rather an expensive hotel just off the road to Banbury. If there is anything that fills me with as much enthusiasm as cars, it is hotels, so I was transported with quiet and concealed joy. We drank a lot of Pimm’s at the bar, and then went and ate a lot of delicious food: Louise always eats an enormous amount and never puts on an ounce. So do I and neither do I. I noticed one curious thing while we were eating: Stephen never seemed to know what to order, and when his food arrived he messed about with it quite horribly, covering it with salt and pepper and French mustard and olive oil, and never more than half-finished anything. He didn’t drink, either: I remember thinking how dreary it must be, to be stone cold sober when everyone else is pleasantly mellow. The talk was quite pleasant: Louise and John talked about the theatre, Stephen and I talked about books and novelists, and so on. Stephen seemed to admire all the people I admired, except for Kingsley Amis. It annoyed me, as I was sure he liked them
Similar Books
