Wigs on the Green by Nancy Mitford Read Free Book Online Page B

woman who was at the same time a natural aesthete. He drank a great quantity of cowslip wine and went back to the Jolly Roger, feeling rather sick, but apart from that, tremendously elated.
    He joined Jasper in the dining-room. Dinner, Mr Birk told him reproachfully, had been ready for some time. Jasper handed him a note which had just arrived from Eugenia, it was addressed to Union Jackshirt Aspect and Union Jackshirt Foster.
    ‘Hail! The filthy old female Pacifist my grandmother has shut me up in my room because I was seen talking to you. She misuses me and tramples upon me as for many years France has misused and trampled upon Germany. It does not signify. Germany has now arisen and I shall soon arise and my day shall dawn blood red. Terrible must be the fate of the enemies of Social Unionism, so let the poor old female beware. I will meet you both tomorrow outside the twopenny-bar shop at four o’clock exactly
.
    ‘Yours in
        
‘Social Unionism
,
            
‘E UGENIA M ALMAINS.’
    This document was adorned with a Swastika, Union Jack, and Skull and Cross-bones, all carefully drawn in black ink.
    ‘She’s a fine girl,’ said Jasper, with his mouth full. ‘I hope to marry her yet. Tell you what, Noel old boy, I’m in love.’
    Noel was profoundly irritated by this statement, which took all the wind out of his own sails.
    ‘So am I,’ he said.
    ‘Good egg,’ said Jasper. They both went on eating in silence for a bit.
    ‘My Miss Smith,’ said Jasper, ‘is a dangerous good armful. She wriggles in an exceedingly delicious way when you kiss her. I’m fearfully in love.’
    Noel thought that there was no point in mentioning that he had not so far kissed his beloved. He wondered now why on earth this was, and supposed that the girl, while perfect in other ways, must be lacking in initiative. ‘My girl is called Anne-Marie,’ he said, ‘Anne-Marie Lace, she is wonderful.’
    ‘How did you pick her up?’ asked Jasper with interest.
    ‘We met,’ said Noel haughtily, ‘on the village green; she was looking for her children.’
    ‘And does she wriggle when you kiss her?’
    ‘Not exactly. She is a most fascinating creature, a natural highbrow. We had a long discussion on art and literature.’
    ‘Sounds a cracking old bore,’ said Jasper, ‘if there’s one thing I can’t abide it is culture in women. Miss Smith reads the
Strand Magazine
and hates foreigners. That’s all I found out about her intellect, but there’s nothing I can’t tell you about her physiological reactions. Darling Miss Smith, I love her like hell, Oh, gee – do I love Miss Smith.’
    Noel felt jealous. It began to look as though Jasper loved Miss Smith more than he, Noel, loved Mrs Lace. This was extremely boring for Noel, and he wished more than ever that Jasper was back in London.
    ‘You wait until you see Anne-Marie,’ he said crossly. ‘I should think she’ll make that Miss Smith of yours look like a – like a – well, like a twopenny bar.’
    ‘That’s right,’ said Jasper, ‘Miss Smith looks to me like a twopenny bar looks to Eugenia, and I’m sure you can’t say fairer than that.’
    ‘What strikes one most particularly about Anne-Marie is her wonderfully original appearance. Her beauty is something different from what we are used to. I suppose it is that she belongs toher environment so exquisitely, she borrows nothing from your smart London women.’
    ‘Yes, I see, a great hulking dairymaid with apple cheeks. Not my type at all, I’m bound to say.’
    ‘Oh! far from that,’ said Noel, with a superior smile, ‘if anything you would call her exotic. Very pale and delicate looking, with a rare quality that hardly seems to belong to our generation. A
Dame aux Camélias
, if you like.’
    ‘Tubercular is she?’ said Jasper. ‘You be careful, old boy.’

5
    Next day the mystery of Miss Jones’s strawberry leaves was solved. Jasper brought the morning papers into Noel’s bedroom just before