An Unsuitable Attachment by Barbara Pym Read Free Book Online Page A

lunched. 'I quite often bring sandwiches,' she said. 'But I believe the pub on the corner's quite good.'
    'I can't imagine you in a pub,' said John, 'or Mr Cantrell, for that matter.'
    'No, he usually brings his own lunch and eats it here.'
    For some reason Ianthe felt tired by so much talking and was glad when half-past twelve came and John suggested tentatively that he might go out. Left to herself she unpacked her sandwiches and got out her writing things. She was absorbed in a letter when Mervyn Cantrell came into the room.
    'Oh good, you haven't finished your lunch yet,' he said. 'I've just been brewing some coffee—I expect you'd like a cup. What's in your sandwiches?' he asked cosily, lifting the corner of one. 'Cold meat,' he declared, sounding disappointed. 'That's not very interesting.'
    'No. I just had a bit of my Sunday joint left over,' said Ianthe apologetically.
    'Have you ever tried a cold egg-and-breadcrumbed veal cutlet eaten in the fingers—holding it by the bone of course?'
    'And with a paper frill?' asked Ianthe. 'It sounds lovely, but somehow I never seem to have time to make things like that and as you know I usually go to the Humming Bird for lunch.'
    'I can't bear those two who run it—English gentlewomen with a vengeance, I always think—the kind that have made England what she is.'
    'I think Mrs Harper and Miss Burge do a very good job under rather difficult conditions,' said Ianthe, 'after all the whole place is very small and the kitchen especially so.'
    'Quite. And who but two women like that would be pigheaded enough to try and run a restaurant there?'
    'Miss Burge's brother was an admiral, and Mrs Harper is the widow of a cathedral organist. I can't remember which cathedral.' Ianthe frowned, trying to recall the name.
    'You imply that she is used to producing a four-course dinner on a primus in the organ loft,' said Mervyn, then, losing interest in the subject, he went on 'How do you think John Challow's shaping?'
    Ianthe hesitated. She certainly had not thought of him as 'shaping' at all in any direction. 'It's rather early to tell,' she said. 'I suppose he's used to this kind of work and will be able to do it once he gets into our ways.'
    'Our ways—and what ways they are!' Mervyn sighed and prepared to go back to his work. 'Perhaps he isn't quite what we've been used to, but I thought we might give him a trial. All the other applicants seemed so highly qualified, I thought they'd probably turn up their noses at what—between ourselves, Ianthe—is really rather a stooge's job. Besides, one gets so tired of willing gentlewomen of uncertain age,' he laughed rather cruelly, 'just when we'd succeeded in getting rid of old Grimes too.'
    Ianthe said nothing. She felt guilty that she had not yet been to visit Miss Grimes in her bed-sitting room somewhere off the Finchley Road, really within easy distance of where she lived, so there was really no excuse. She made a resolution to go before Christmas.
    When John returned from lunch—very punctually, just before half-past one—Ianthe found herself studying him and taking in the details of his appearance. She could find no fault with his dark grey suit, red patterned tie and white shirt. Only his shoes seemed to be a little too pointed—not quite what men one knew would wear. He was less talkative now and settled down to work quietly, only occasionally asking her a question about what he was doing.
    When tea was brought he took out a book he had been reading over his lunch. It turned out to be—most improbably, Ianthe thought—a paperback selection of the poems of Tennyson.
    'You read poetry?' she asked rather formally.
    'Oh, yes—do you?'
    'Yes,' she said hesitantly, wishing that now she had not commented on the book, for one did not talk about poetry with chance acquaintances. It was a precious thing to be kept to oneself. She felt she did not know where to begin with Tennyson, imagining him plodding through In Memoriam, though perhaps