Getting an invitation to Dinner
Sometimes in the evenings I’m invited out to fill in Country Calendars, which occasionally inspires a bit of diary work.
The evening that I’ll describe for you, was as a result of a meeting when attending a Musical event I maybe told you about, and was a formal invitation to a dinner.
I accepted without realizing it was a Singles Night.
I arrived dutifully clutching my bottle of possibly inferior wine from the local Spar, a hasty choice and speedy drive along winding country roads, a few wrong turns that led me eventually to find the land mark crumbling stone pillars along a Welsh green lane.
Stepping out in my seriously high L.K.Bennett’s with the black bows; purchased one shopaholic day in Hampstead, I trod noisily up the gravel, loving a moment the warm damp evening air and entered the large dark doorway of this rambling country house.
I gave up my Chardonay but was reluctant to give up my coat, like a first day child at nursery but more from cold than fear, and was ushered into an amply furnished room.
To keep the sun out, the heavy brocade curtains had probably been closed all day to protect the surface of the family treasures.
Lack of illumination was I decided an invisible aspect of a wealthy inheritance and the northern chill a lack of ready finance.
When eventually I was introduced to some of the other guests I instantly forgot their names.
I am surprisingly distracting by being in other peoples curious interiors, seeing on the walls the conversations between ancestral portraits while at the same moment absorbing a living person on all the levels and add to that the need to retain bodily heat.
I was glad I’d worn more than was requested on the invite, ( jacket and tie).
I’d dressed demure and devastatingly low key in my blacks.
Standing in the shadows of the softly lit period drawing room with the other ladies, we looked like women from a Bronte novel patiently awaiting partners for the dance.
Every one assembled but it seemed our lovely hosts had invited three women and two men.
Did some one chicken out?
Later in the candle lit, kindly respectful of our personal patina dining room, we were offered chicken as part of the meal, was this the fate of our missing single guest?
The smiley man, who sat opposite across the mahogany and through the large silver candelabra, was Arron or was it Arnold from somewhere south.
I didn’t grasp the others name except he talked war and flew a lot, not during the meal though I’m glad to say.
I never discovered what everyone did, I guess I should ask.
I’m not as direct as our host.
Seriously, husbands matter to him it seams, maybe he’s OK with sharing though, as here we women had two, potentially, between three.
His introductory question to me, when we had sat together at the musical dinner event was, ‘and who is your husband?’
I could have said that’s for me to know and you to find out, or ‘and who is your wife?’
My reply was probably disappointing as he has a real nose for networking.
I hoped he had imagined a Russian Duke for me, and that’s what motivated him to arrange this charming meal, but he somewhat curtailed my chances as he seated me between him and his wife.
One of us Bronte’s told some really amusing travel tales between courses. Visits to ‘after the Raj’ type Palaces in India, where, ‘My Dear, the rain was running down the Rembrandts’.
Sipping the cellars best, the men were quieter, but nice guys and as I had to miss the coffee, I missed the kisses too.
I wonder if romance emerged from the sterling effort by my hosts and their enchanting children, who before I left, proceeded at about 11.30, to wind us in a magic spell by rushing around and around the table at some speed. Stopping only for moments to climb on any available lap and daintily demolish cheese, ensuring a vivid night between the sheets, though some fell asleep on the floor, so journeys to the loo had to be trodden with considerable care.
Going early, I picked my way out around midnight, as my drive was almost an hour.
I slept boringly well, and for a scary second on the way home behind the wheel.