Chapter 10: Kensington Gardens Fairies
"YOU'VE MISSED DINNER, MR. GRANTHAM!" Anders yelled as Carson entered the downstairs entrance of Painswick Place. Carson ignored him and bolted up the stairs to deliver Lady Grantham's gift to Lord Grantham's room. "Deaf as a post." Anders said as he shook his head.
With only moments to spare, Carson pulled the dark green box with a plaid bow out of the Harrods bag and put it on His Lordship's dressing table. Carson knew his services were not needed tonight. Lord Grantham would have plenty of help undressing. Hastily, Carson threw fresh pajamas, a dressing gown and slippers at the small bed. The mantle clock told him he didn't have much time until Lord and Lady Grantham bid the girls goodnight and retired. At the door, Carson scanned the scene, looking for anything glaringly out of place.
Plaid bow? That wasn't the right gift! He'd like to see how His Lordship explained Carson's gift for Mrs. Hughes to Lady Grantham. Carson hurried over and swapped the gifts. Much better. This box was also wrapped in green, but it had … a plaid bow! Carson pulled the first box out of the bag and placed the two gifts side by side. They were almost identical in every aspect. The dimensions were the same, the paper was the same Harrods green and they both had plaid bows. The plaids were different, but not very; one had more red than green and one had a lot more red than green.
In a near panic, Carson shook the boxes, first one and then the other, but to no avail. Both gifts had been too well packaged to shift. There was only one way, but there was not much time. Carson would have to open at least one of the gifts.
Carson thought his gift for Elsie would be the heavier of the two, but he could barely discern a difference in their weights. Finally, he just had to plough ahead. Taking the gift he hoped very much was not Her Ladyship's, Carson began to carefully slide the ribbons off without disturbing the bow or wrinkling the paper. Finally, the ribbon was off and the paper unfolded easily. Carson opened the box and dug in the dense tissue paper until he found…Elsie's gift.
Thank God. Throwing the ribbon and paper and box into the bag, Carson lunged for the door just as the handle moved. Blast! Coughing terribly, so as to alert His Lordship to his presence, Carson hid the Harrods bag hastily in a drawer of the dressing table.
As the door opened, Carson stood at attention as though he had been expecting Lord Grantham. "Carson?" Robert was confused; he thought Carson had understood that he was not needed this evening.
"Good evening, My Lord. I trust you had a pleasant Christmas Eve?"
"Good evening, Carson." Lady Grantham joined her husband in the doorway.
"My Lady."
"Goodness, Carson! What do you smell like?" Cora exclaimed as the cloud of fragrances surrounding Carson reached her. "And what have you been up to?" She teased.
"I was out enjoying the Christmas excitement and walked into the wrong shop, My Lady." Carson half lied, coloring slightly. He could hardly say he'd been shopping for Her Ladyship or for Mrs. Hughes. "Do you require anything else, My Lord?"
"No, Carson, you are dismissed." Lord Grantham said through clinched teeth.
"Of course, My Lord, I am very sorry. I must have misunderstood you this morning. Apparently, I am going deaf." He added under his breath.
"What?"
"Nothing, My Lady, just a little joke between myself and the Painswick staff." Awkwardly, Carson grabbed up the nearest item, which turned out to be a jar of hair pomade. "I was just making sure everything was in order for tomorrow, My Lord. I did not realize the time." He opened the jar, looked at the contents and nodded satisfactorily. He set the brand new jar back on the dresser and tried to look as though he had just averted a major crisis.
"Good night, Carson." Lord Grantham said testily.
"Yes, My Lord. Good night. Good night, My Lady."
-00-
Elsie sat beside the fire in her sitting room, rereading his letter with a large glass of red wine; her second of the evening. After the advice about the fish stew, the content had improved significantly…
'Though I am glad to be of service to His Lordship, I find that I am feeling rather a hostage in London. While I try to stay busy, there is very little for me to do, compared to the list of things I know I should be doing at Downton.
I wish I were home to celebrate our first Christmas together as heads of household. I feel guilty for abandoning you to oversee the staff festivities alone, but I am sure you are handling things expertly and I shall be the only one who will feel any negative effects from my absence.
London offers its usual distractions, but I cannot even enjoy those. I have just enough free time to leave the house, but not enough to properly visit the museums that are so tantalizingly close. I have indulged in a few walks through Kensington Gardens, which features so heavily in the book I hope you are able to find time to enjoy.
I've been trying to catch sight of a sleeping fairy. Though I am skeptical, if Mr. Barrie is correct, they should be hiding in plain sight. I did see a suspect flowerbed yesterday. It is far too early for any flowers, even Snowdrops. I am sure they were a family of disguised fairies.
Also, I found a ring of mushrooms, where I suspect they've held a dance on more than a few occasions on a walk between the Round Pond and the Long Water- such original names these garden features have!
A funny thing happened after luncheon today. I only include it because I know you'll appreciate this, for two reasons; I know you are fond of Lady Sybil and you may have read far enough in the Little White Bird to find the story humorous.
I was invited upstairs to witness the girls hanging their bicycle ornaments on the tree. I was flattered that they had remembered to pack them amidst all the excitement surrounding His Lordship's return. Afterward, Lady Sybil asked if she could give me a Thimble. Lady Grantham told her no, as she rightfully should, but none of the other adults knew what they were talking about. They'll find out at the theatre on Saturday. And you either already know or will find out, depending on how far into Mr. Barrie's book you currently are. I shall leave the story there for fear of spoiling the discovery.
I am reaching that terrible point in a letter where one must either stop writing or commit oneself to an entire additional page. To spare you any further ramblings, I shall stop. Until I am home again, your friend,
C. Carson
P.S. I cannot make up for missing your first Christmas as Downton's housekeeper, but if there is anything you would like for me to bring you from London, you've only to ask."
Sighing, Elsie refolded his letter and slid it into the book that sat in her lap; his book, the one she had completed last night. It was hardly a love letter, but it was the first thing he had written to her and she knew she would save it always. He'd sent Mrs. Pearson updates from London this past Season, which she shared with Elsie, but this was written to her; too Miss Elsie Hughes. And it was not all work related. He had shared several personal thoughts, silly ideas like the ones that she thought he saved only for the girls. She was in the inner circle of his heart now and it was a warm and comforting place to be.
She smiled to think of him strolling through the palace gardens. No one else in the garden would imagine that the grim faced butler was looking for signs of fairies. For she knew he would be grim faced, considering the temper he claimed to be in. Hopefully, his walks and his thoughts of 'The Little White Bird'; and of me; had the effect of lightening his mood.
She picked up the book and thumbed gently through the pages. She knew he had marked the page with the Thimble scene.
Elsie had been pleasantly surprised to see that Mr. Carson wrote in his books, bracketing and underlining random passages that must have struck a chord with him. It made her want to borrow some of his other personal books, even if there was a copy in the library.
The thimble scene was rather late in the story, during the introduction of Peter Pan. The young girl whom Peter tries to recruit as a mother offers to give Peter a kiss. In the ensuing confusion, Peter comes to believe that a Thimble is called a Kiss and vice versa.
Elsie smiled at the idea of sweet little Sybil giving Mr. Carson a Thimble. In fact, Elsie had witnessed just that this summer. She found the page and reread the strange exchange between Peter and Maimie.
'"I shall give you a kiss if you like," but though he once knew he had long forgotten what kisses are, and he replied, "Thank you," and held out his hand, thinking she had offered to put something into it. This was a great shock to her, but she felt she could not explain without shaming him, so with charming delicacy she gave Peter a thimble which happened to be in her pocket, and pretended that it was a kiss. Poor little boy! he quite believed her, and to this day he wears it on his finger, though there can be scarcely anyone who needs a thimble so little.'
Elsie thought, Peter Pan was a strange mixture of sweet innocence and cruel thoughtlessness. It was the thoughtlessness that hurt people, but they could never stay mad at him for long because of the innocence. She scanned down the page to the section he had bracketed. Sometimes, Mrs. Hughes suspected that Mr. Carson was as innocent about some things as Peter Pan. But he could also be as thoughtless.
'Also in play, but girl =Wendy' was written in the margin beside the continuing text.
"...And if you want very much to give me a kiss," Maimie said, "you can do it."
Very reluctantly Peter began to take the thimble off his finger. He thought she wanted it back.
"I don't mean a kiss," she said hurriedly, "I mean a thimble."
"What's that?" Peter asked.
"It's like this," she said, and kissed him.
"I should love to give you a thimble," Peter said gravely, so he gave her one. He gave her quite a number of thimbles, and then a delightful idea came into his head! "Maimie," he said, "will you marry me?"
Elsie thumbed back through the coarse pages to find the page she had almost learned by heart. The Little White Bird was indeed an odd little story, as Mr. Carson had warned her. The main hero was not Peter Pan, but a retired gentleman soldier, unmarried and living the life of the idle rich. He was a no nonsense sort who uses the words of a misanthrope, but performs the actions of a philanthropist. In one humorous series of tales, he basically saves the life of a woman because that woman's husband and daughter were disrupting his lunches at the club by worrying about her health.
He also mends a broken engagement because the couple's misery plays out in front of his club window and it disturbs him. But, even after effecting their reconciliation, he claims it was a malevolent act designed to torture them both with the terrible institution of marriage.
His credibility as a misanthrope is further compromised when he begins to help the young newlyweds financially, mocking them the whole time, but eventually going so far as to purchase the home they are leasing and leasing it back to them on incredibly generous terms.
The heart of the story is the relationship between the gentleman and this couple's son. At one point, he makes up a son of his own so he can talk to the young father. He names his son Timothy and talks about him as if he were real. When the fathers exchange stories about their children, the gentleman describes his adventures with his Saint Bernard.
Elsie understood now what Charles meant by Barrie seeing the world through the eyes of a child. This character was exactly like that. He had somehow retained the boundless imagination of a child, but had difficulties reconciling that with the expectations society placed on adults of his station. He went to his club, but he also enjoyed telling stories to children in Kensington Gardens.
If the story were not written from the man's point of view, Elsie was sure the relationship between the child and the older man might feel off. But, the man's motives were clearly not sinister. Through the narrative, it is revealed that the older gentleman is just lonely and finds it easier to interact with those whom society has not yet molded; namely his dog and the young boy.
The story treats the graduation to wearing knickerbockers as a boy's rite of passage to manhood and the beginning of the end of his imagination. The gentleman laments this passage as though losing a friend to Death. Certainly, the loss of innocence is a sort of death, Elsie thought. The boy, David, is almost the same age as Lady Sybil and reminded Elsie very much of the youngest Crawley. Sybil was approaching the age at which, like her sisters before her, she would have to begin to conform to society's pressures. Elsie hoped the child would retain some of her sweetness.
In one of the more bizarre events, of the story, the man kills off his imaginary son so he can make a gift of clothing to the young family without it seeming strange. They see through the ruse pretty easily, but he still refuses to admit anything. In fact, he refuses to speak to David's mother throughout the entire book, competing with her for David's attention, calling her all sorts of names and crowing when David chooses the man's company over his mother's. To a man like that, Peter Pan was the perfect hero; no responsibilities, no fears. The only thing Peter ever regrets is not having a mother, but even that, he cannot regret for long.
All in all, it was a book that, like its protagonist, did not ask to be taken too seriously. It was primarily a silly story about adventures between friends in the heart of London. Was it odd that those friends were a retired soldier, a five year old boy and a Saint Bernard? Perhaps, but the story was entertaining. There were some very serious, even poignant passages. The book opened automatically to one such passage. He had obviously read this page many times.
In the middle of the right hand page, the majority of a paragraph was surrounded by bold double brackets. He had even underlined a few sentences. Elsie filled her wine glass again before she reread the words for the umpteenth time. The bachelor gentleman was recollecting the lost love of his youth.
"I hear her hailing me now. She was so light-hearted that her laugh is what comes first across the years; so high-spirited that she would have wept like Mary of Scots because she could not lie on the bare plains like the men. I hear her, but it is only as an echo; I see her, but it is as a light among distant trees, and the middle-aged man can draw no nearer; she was only for the boys. There was a month when I could have shown her to you in all her bravery, but then the veil fell, and from that moment I understood her not. For long I watched her, but she was never clear to me again, and for long she hovered round me, like a dear heart willing to give me a thousand chances to regain her love. She was so picturesque that she was the last word of art, but she was as young as if she were the first woman. The world must have rung with gallant deeds and grown lovely thoughts for numberless centuries before she could be; she was the child of all the brave and wistful imaginings of men. She was as mysterious as night when it fell for the first time upon the earth. She was the thing we call romance, which lives in the little hut beyond the blue haze of the pine-woods."
Elsie mused over this page for many silent minutes, sipping her wine and imagining these words, especially the underlined words, spoken in Mr. Carson's gentlest voice; the one he used when comforting the girls or wishing her a good night. Some part of her wanted to believe that he thought of her when he read these words, as she thought of him.
That's it! She decided. She was going to bloody well find out! Elsie walked unsteadily to her desk and withdrew her stationary. Pouring the last of the wine from the bottle, she contemplated how to begin. Finally, she put her pen to the paper and wrote, "To My Dearest Butler…"
A/N Yup, I believe Elsie is about to perform the Edwardian equivalent to a drunk dial;)
I hope you enjoyed my little book report on The Little White Bird. It really is very sweetly written and offers a great insight into the turn of the last century.