Sir John Makes Changes

Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.

 

Today Lettice’s oldest childhood chum, Gerald Bruton is visiting. Although also a member of the aristocracy Gerald’s fate is very different to Lettice’s. He has been forced to gain some independence from his rather impecunious family in order to make a living. Luckily his artistic abilities have led him to designing gowns from a shop in Grosvenor Street, a business which, after promotion from Lettice and several commissions from high profile and influential society ladies, is finally beginning to turn a profit. The two are taking tea from Lettice’s beautiful and avant-garde Royal Doulton Falling Leaves tea set whilst they wait for Edith, Lettice’s maid, to prepare a light cold luncheon for them. Across the low black japanned coffee table between them is spread a long papyrus* scroll featuring beautiful and wonderfully colourful Egyptian hieroglyphic writing and images. Arriving in a wooden box also marked with hieroglyphs, it is one of two Lettice has in her possession.

 

“There really are remarkable, Lettice darling!” Gerald enthuses as he runs his hands with reverence across the fine fibrous paper. “And in such condition for something so ancient.”

 

Lettice looks across the table at her friend and laughs loudly.

 

“What’s so funny?” Gerald asks in innocent surprise, glancing up from the scroll at Lettice.

 

“Oh Gerald, you silly thing!” Lettice giggles, raising a dainty hand with prettily manicured nails to her smiling lips. “This isn’t a real Egyptian papyrus scroll! I know some of my clients can afford to have real papyri on their walls, but this is a very well executed imitation!”

 

“An imitation?” Gerald’s eyes grow wide. When Lettice nods, he goes on, “Well, it certainly is an excellent copy, I’d never have known.”

 

“It came from Lancelot de Vries antiques and curios shop in the Portobello Road**.” Lettice elucidates.

 

“Ahh,” Gerald murmurs, settling back in the comfortable white upholstered rounded back of Lettice’s tub armchair. “That explains it then. No wonder it’s so good. Old Lottie,” He casually uses a female nickname*** instead of the antique dealer’s real name, indicating that he knows Mr. de Vries well. “Is so incredibly talented that he could have made a successful career out of forging old masters, if he hadn’t decided to tow the straight and narrow and become an antiques and objet d'art dealer.”

 

“Gerald!” Lettice gasps.

 

“It’s true! Just look at the quality in this piece.” He waves his hand expansively towards the unfurled scroll. “I could have sworn it was the genuine article.”

 

“Well, I don’t know about you, Gerald darling, but I don’t fancy spending the money on a real papyrus scroll from ancient Egypt just to hang on a wall until this Tutmaina**** craze ends.”

 

“So, this isn’t for you then, Lettice darling?”

 

“No. I’m taking this on approval from Mr. de Vries, who just received a shipment of them. He’s selling them in his shop. They race out the door quicker than you can say knife, apparently. I’m going to show these to Mrs. Hatchett and see whether she would like an Egyptian themed reception room.”

 

“Knowing Dolly Hatchett as well as I do, and knowing just how much she admires you and your taste,” Gerald opines. “I think something more oriental,” He waves his hands around Lettice’s drawing room, indicating to her Chinoiserie furniture, her Japanese screen and her Chinese ceramics. “Will appeal to her more.”

 

“But she gave be carte blanche to decorate her suite of rooms as I see fit, Gerald.”

 

“Then why are you asking her for her opinion?” Gerald looks at his best friend with a knowing look. He doesn’t wait for a reply from her. “I’ll tell you why. Because you know that even though she made you that promise, she will want to be consulted. This is a bigger project than ‘The Gables,” He refers to the Hatchetts’ Sussex house in Rotherfield and Mark Cross which Lettice partially redecorated in 1922. “This is all about promoting Charles Hatchett’s power and influence as an MP. Dolly won’t want to set a foot wrong. She knows she can’t afford to as much for her own sake as for Charles’. She has been a social pariah, relegated as the pretty flibbertigibbet Gaiety Girl***** from the chorus line of ‘Chu-Chin-Chow’****** who dared to look beyond her class and marry a successful banker with political aspirations. Now she is a successful MP’s wife, so she needs to show that she has impeccable taste, even if the taste really isn’t her own.”

 

Lettice sighs heavily. “You’re right Gerald darling. It’s true”

 

“Of course I’m right.” Gerald picks up his cup of tea and takes a sip from it. “However, I also know that as such an arbiter of what is fashionable, if you told Dolly Hatchett that you wanted to paint her reception room violent purple with green polka dots because it was the height of fashion, she’d let you, even if she hated it.”

 

“You know I would never do that to anyone, Gerald darling.” Lettice takes up her own cup of tea from the edge of the table which houses her telephone and a vase of fresh red roses from her fiancée, Sir John Nettleford-Hughes.

 

“I know.” he assures her.

 

The movement near to them, brings Gerald’s attention to the roses. Nodding at them, he asks, “Are those from your intended?”

 

Lettice looks at the fat blooms with their rich red velvety petals which are dispersed with fluffy white pompoms of Gypsophila****** and considers them, as if seeing them for the first time. “Yes.” she replies rather flatly.

 

Old enough to be her father, Lettice is engaged to be married to wealthy Sir John Nettleford-Huges. His engagement to Lettice came as something of a surprise to London society as he was always considered to be a confirmed old bachelor, and according to whispered upper-class gossip intended to remain so, so that he might continue to enjoy his dalliances with a string of pretty chorus girls of Lettice’s age and younger. After an abrupt ending to her understanding with Selwyn Spencely, son and heir to the title Duke of Walmsford, Lettice in a moment of both weakness and resolve, agreed to the proposal of marriage proffered to her by Sir John. More like a business arrangement than a marriage proposal, Sir John offered Lettice the opportunity to enjoy the benefits of his large fortune, be chatelain of all his estates and continue to have her interior design business, under the conditions that she agree to provide him with an heir, and that he be allowed to discreetly carry on his affairs in spite of their marriage vows. He even suggested that Lettice might be afforded the opportunity to have her own extra marital liaisons if she were discreet about them.

 

“What of them?” Lettice goes on.

 

“Oh nothing.” Gerald remarks dismissively with an air of laissez-faire********. “I was just wondering.”

 

“I’ve known you all my life, Gerrald darling.” Lettice shakes her head and looks seriously at her best friend. “You were doing more than wondering. What is it? Come on. Spit it out!”

 

“Well, it’s just that when I was visiting Cyril at Hattie’s recently, Hattie showed me a book that had belonged to her mother. It’s called Floral Symbolica*********. She thought I might like to read it because it discusses the meaning of flowers, so that when I gave Cyril a bouquet of blooms, it would express my love for him.”

 

“And?” Lettice smiles.

 

“Well, dark red roses like those, are supposed to represent a more sophisticated and serious affection than a bright red rose, expressing eternal love, loyalty, and a heartfelt devotion.”

 

“And?”

 

“Oh look!” Gerald sighs sadly. “There’s no nice way for me to tell you this, but Cyril is friends with Paula Young, who I know is your intended’s latest conquest.”

 

Lettice’s heart begins to race at the mention of the young and pretty West End actress’ name. With a slight tremor, she lowers her teacup back into its saucer. “I know that too, Gerald darling. You know I do. John has been very forthright and honest about that facet of his life, and I know he won’t stop.”

 

“Well, Cyril knows about it too, and of course he knows through me that you and Sir John are engaged to be married.”

 

Lettice gulps as a shudder runs through her and she feels the blood drain from her face. “But how does he know about Miss Young and John?”

 

“Through Miss Young herself, I assume. From what Cyril’s mentioned about her, she is something of a parvenu, and she is rather indiscreet about her discretions. He told me as much the other night when I stayed with him at Hattie’s.”

 

“Oh no!” Lettice gasps, raising her hands to her cheeks which suddenly feel hot to the touch as they fill with embarrassed colour. “But Cyril is coming to Sylvia’s weekend house party now, and so are John and I! Oh Gerald!” Tears well in her eyes and threaten to spill over.

 

Gerald immediately thrusts his cup noisily back into its saucer and leaps up with sudden urgency. He scuttles around the low coffee table and wraps his arms around Lettice, pulling her to his chest as the tears start to spill from her sparkling blue eyes.

 

“Don’t worry, dear Lettice.” Gerald assures her. “I’ve spoken to him. I’ve told Cyril in no uncertain terms that he can’t mention that he knows anything about Sir John’s and Miss Young’s liaison to anyone, especially at the party, and that he is to keep mum**********.”

 

“Oh Gerald!” Lettice sobs. “John promised me that he would never do anything to shame me in public as far as his…” She intakes a large gulp of air. “His dalliances.”

 

“Well,” Gerald says in defence of Sir John, gently chuckling sadly as he strokes Lettice’s back comfortingly through her French blue cardigan***********. “I suppose he doesn’t imagine that you would ever know a poor West End musician who just happens to be a friend of sorts with his latest flame.”

 

Lettice sniffs and pulls a clean and freshly laundered lace trimmed handkerchief from the left-hand sleeve of her cardigan and dabs at her eyes and nose, as Gerald crouches down in front of her, so that he can look her squarely in the face.

 

“He won’t, will he?” She sniffs again.

 

“Cyril?” Gerald asks. When Lettice nods shallowly he goes on, “No of course he won’t. I know that he may not be the most discreet of people, but I really have made it perfectly clear to him how important it is that he doesn’t let on about any of it. For all his faults, he likes you very much, Lettice, and he’d never want to embarrass or hurt you.”

 

“Well, if you’re sure.” Lettice gulps again.

 

“Of course I am, Lettuce Leaf!” he replies, using his childhood nickname for her, which he knows she hates, in order to try and break her moment of worry by introducing a note of levity.

 

“Don’t call me that Gerald! You know how I hate it!” she replies.

 

“That’s better.” Gerald smiles. “Now dry those eyes. Luncheon will be ready soon, and you don’t want to sit at the table all red and puffy eyed, do you?”

 

Just at that moment, Lettice’s Bakelite************ and chrome telephone starts to ring and jangle on the small side table next to her.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

Both Lettice and Gerald glance with startled eyes at it in alarm, as though it has overheard their conversation and has an opinion of its own to express.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

Lettice sniffs and takes a deep intake of breath. “I suppose it would be rather awful of me to expect Edith to answer the telephone when I’m right alongside it, wouldn’t it?”

 

“Beastly, Lettice darling!” Gerald replies.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“You know how she feels about that ‘infernal contraption’,” Gerald goes on quoting Lettice’s maid’s name for the telephone. “If you must irritate her, please do so after she’s served us luncheon. I don’t know about you, but I can barely boil a kettle, never mind cook a meal.”

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

Gerald pauses and considers something. “Then again, maybe you should make her answer it. She might get so upset by having to do so, that she’ll hand in her notice.”

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

Lettice sniffs again and dabs her eyes for good measure as she goes to lift the receiver.

 

“And, if she does give notice,” Gerald quickly adds as Lettice grasps the receiver. “I’ll hire Edith as a seamstress for my atelier. Her talents as a needlewoman are wasted here.”

 

“Not a chance!” Lettice replies defiantly. “She’s coming with me, not going with you.”

 

BBBBRRR…

 

Lettice picks up the handset out of its gleaming chrome cradle mid ring, causing the shrill jingle of the telephone to stop and quickly peter out.

 

“Mayfair 432,” Lettice announces in clearly enunciated syllables.

 

As Gerald returns to his tub chair, he can hear a deep male voice resonate from somewhere down the line, recognising them as Sir John’s tones, not that he can make out the words. The shock of knowing the man he and Lettice were just talking about is on the other end of the telephone call makes him freeze for a moment as a shiver runs up his spine.

 

“John darling!” Lettice exclaims almost a little too jovially. “How are you?” She listens to the response. “Oh, that’s good. Are we still having dinner at Le Bienvenue************* tonight?” She listens again. “Oh hoorah. Jolly good.” Sir John’s voice speaks again at the other end of the line, his tone serious. At length he pauses. “Oh no! Oh, poor Clemance. I must pay a call upon her then and do some sick visiting.” Sir John speaks up urgently. “Oh very well John. I won’t.” He speaks again. “No of course, John darling. You’re quite right. I don’t want to get sick before Sylvia’s party. I’ll telephone the Regent Street Flower Box directly and arrange for Monsieur Blanchet to send her a lovely bunch of flowers to brighten her day. You know Gerald and I were just talking about the meaning of flowers, John darling.” Sir John speaks again. “Yes. Yes, he’s here. We’re about to have luncheon, so I can’t speak for too long.” Lettice listens again. “Yes… yes… what about the party?” Sir John’s voice drones on, too indistinctly for Gerald to hear anything, and he feigns that he is not paying attention by looking down at his well manicured nails and rubbing them as if trying to buff them with the pads of his fingers on the opposite hand. “Oh.” Lettice sighs and her shoulders slump. “You want to ask her then do you?” Sir John speaks again. “Oh you did, John dear?” He mumbles something else. “She did? That was very kind of Sylvia to consider me like that.” There is more indistinct chatter at the other end of the telephone line. “Well,” Lettice tries to muffle a resigned sigh. “Well, if you feel you must, then I suppose you must.” Sir John’s voice seems to perk a little and he sounds less dour. “No. No, I don’t mind. Of course I don’t, especially if it will make you happy, dear John.” Gerald can see a light dim in her eyes. “Very well. Alright…” she falters for a moment and gulps. “I’ll see you at eight then.” she adds a little too brightly. “Yes, goodbye then.”

 

Lettice hangs the handset back on the cradle, the action causing the telephone to utter a single echoing ting as she does. She stares ahead of her, but her look is blank, suggesting that she sees nothing.

 

“What was that all about?” Gerald asks in concern as he looks at Lettice’s suddenly wan face.

 

“It was just John.” Lettice replies flatly.

 

“Yes, I could gather that, Lettice darling. What did he say?”

 

“Clemance is sick in bed with a nasty head cold. The doctor has told her to stay abed and keep warm to avoid it going to her lungs, so she won’t be coming to ‘The Nest’ now.”

 

“Oh, that is a pity. I was so looking forward to meeting Sir John’s sister. You speak of Mrs. Pontefract so highly.”

 

“So now, since Clemance isn’t coming,” Lettice continues, speaking as though she hasn’t heard Gerald talk. “He’s decided to invite Paula Young to come and spend the weekend with us.”

 

“What?” Gerald sits bolt upright in his seat.

 

“Yes. He asked Sylvia if she would mind, since she knows about his affair with Miss Young, and he feels that the rarified artistic company in attendance will be quite fine with his little arrangement of having both his fiancée and his mistress in the same house at the same time.”

 

“And what did Sylvia say to that?”

 

“Well, Sylvia is a bit of a free spirit when it comes to the sanctity of marriage, and matters of love and lust. She said she didn’t mind if he did ask Miss Young to join him, but only under the proviso that John asked me and got my permission first.”

 

“Which you evidently granted.” Gerald replies in breathless disbelief.

 

“I did.” Lettice replies flatly.

 

“You could have said no, Lettice. You should have said no!”

 

“Oh, how could I, Gerald darling?”

 

“Very simply.” he replies, folding his arms akimbo over his muted toned Fair Isle jumper************** and looking sternly at his best friend. “No darling, I’m sorry but you can’t invite that trollop*************** you share your bed with most nights to Miss Fordyce’s party.”

 

“I can’t Gerald darling.” Lettice defends.

 

“Well, I think you can. Just telephone him back right now. Where is he? Belgravia? His club?”

 

“He’s at home in Belgravia.”

 

“Well then, telephone him immediately and just tell him you’ve had a change of heart, and that no, Miss Young can’t come to the party at ‘The Nest’.”

 

“It’s not that simple, Gerald darling.” Lettice tries to explain, attempting to speak whilst using all her power to prevent herself from crying again. “This engagement is complex. John doesn’t want jealousy in his relationships. He certainly doesn’t want a jealous wife. He told me from the start that he has no intention of desisting from his dalliances, and that if I said yes to his proposal, I must accept him on those terms. He’ll be furious if I tell him no, now. It will be like me flying in the face of everything I agreed to when I said yes to him.”

 

“You don’t actually have to go through with it, you know, Lettice darling?”

 

“What? Going to stay with Sylvia at ‘The Nest’? I can’t Gerald darling! She’s throwing this party to show off her new feature wall. I’m her guest of honour. I can’t possibly withdraw so late in the piece, and with no real reason to decline. It would be rude, and undignified.”

 

“No, Lettice!” Gerald replies dourly. “I mean, you don’t have to go through with the marriage to Sir John. You are perfectly entitled to break it off, if you feel so inclined.”

 

“And risk the fury of Mater?” Lettice looks at Gerald in alarm and shakes her head vehemently. “No thank you! I think I’d rather put up with a hundred Miss Youngs than Mater in a black mood over my lack of securing an eligible husband! All the time she is investing in wedding plans. If it is all for naught, she will be fit to be tied! She sent me a clipping from the Wiltshire Times and Trowbridge Advertiser**************** a few weeks ago.”

 

“Why? What did it say?”

 

“Jonty Hastings is getting married.”

 

“Howley Hastings is getting married?” Gerald guffaws, using the childhood nickname given Jonty Hastings by he, Lettice and the other children of the big houses in the district who used to play with him, because of his propensity to cry whenever he was teased about anything. “Who’d want to marry Howley Hastings?”

 

“Sarah Frobisher apparently, according to the article.” Lettice replies.

 

“Sarah Frobisher? Sarah Frobisher?” Gerald ruminates, rolling the name around his mouth and off his tongue as he considers where he has heard that name before. “Wasn’t she that rather horsey looking niece of the Miss Evanses?” He refers to the two elderly genteel gossipy spinster sisters who live in Holland House, a Seventeenth Century manor house, in Glynes village at the foot of Lettice’s and his family estates in Wiltshire. “You know, the gawky one with protruding teeth and spectacles who always laughed nervously whenever a boy spoke to her. Her father was in trade*****************. Yes, the Frobisher Clothing Mills in Trowbridge.”

 

“Yes, I think that’s her.”

 

“Well, those two deserve each other then, if you ask me, if she’s still as gawky now as she was when we were children. They can dance the Wibbly Wobbly Walk***************** together into the happily ever after, and good riddance to them both.”

 

“Oh! That’s cruel, Gerald. Don’t be beastly!” Lettice chides her best friend sharply. “You aren’t a spiteful person.”

 

“Well,” Gerald mumbles contritely. “You have to admit that Howley can’t dance. Think about your poor trampled feet the last time you had to dance with him. Why on earth did Sadie send you a clipping about Howley marrying that Frobisher creature?”

 

“I think to highlight the fact that another one of the few eligible bachelors she was able to find to invite to her 1922 husband hunting Hunt Ball for me is no longer eligible. Pickings are slim.”

 

“All I am saying, Lettice darling,” Gerald goes on kindly. “Is that, slim pickings or not, if you’re not going to be happy in the end, I happen to think that marrying Sir John is a mistake. An unhappy and loveless marriage isn’t worth it.”

 

“Now don’t you start too, Gerald!” Lettice quips. “I have enough problems with Margot and Dickie trying to dissuade me from marrying John. Even Cilla seems lukewarm about the idea, and John’s almost like an honourary uncle to her.”

 

“I’m not!” Gerald defends, holding up his palms. “I only said ‘if’. If has a great deal of meaning and implication for such a tiny word, you know. For example: if however, you think you will be happy with your lot in life with Sir John, marry him. As I have said to you before, I cannot even marry the person I love.”

 

“Oh yes, how foolish of me.” Lettice replies. “Forgive me for wallowing.”

 

“There is nothing to forgive, Lettice darling. You’re my best friend! I only want you to be happy.”

 

“Thank you, Gerald darling.” Lettice replies gratefully. “Meanwhile, now you can tell your Cyril that he won’t need to bite his tongue and keep his own counsel quite so much, if Miss Young is going to be at ‘The Nest’. John will be all over her, I’m sure. And if he isn’t, from what I can gather from John, she certainly will be.”

 

“Well,” Gerald sighs. “That will certainly enliven what is already going to be a rather lively weekend, I suspect.”

 

At that moment, Edith walks into the drawing room.

 

“Luncheon is served, Miss.” she announces with a bob curtsey.

 

“Thank you, Edith.” Lettice says gratefully.

 

“Yes, thank you Edith.” Gerald adds. “It’s good of you to feed me at such short notice.”

 

“Oh, it’s no trouble, Sir.” Edith replies with a beaming smile, thankful at Gerald’s recognition of her efforts. “It’s always a pleasure to have you at Cavendish Mews.”

 

As Lettice and Gerald both stand, and Edith turns to go, Gerald stops her. “By the way, Edith?”

 

“Yes Sir?” she asks, stopping and looking back at him.

 

“How’s your sewing going?”

 

“My sewing, Sir?” Edith asks, perplexed.

 

“Gerald!” Lettice cautions her friend.

 

“Yes, your frock making. Have you made anything new lately?”

 

“Oh,” Edith replies with a happy sigh and a smile. “It’s going well, thank you for asking, Sir, especially since Mrs. Boothby’s so…” She quickly swallows the word son, as she isn’t sure whether Lettice knows that the old Cockney charwoman****************** who comes to Cavendish Mews from Poplar every few days to help Edith with the harder housekeeping jobs, has a son, never mind a disabled one. “Found me a sewing machine. Now I don’t have to go to my Mum’s to do any sewing or alterations. I can do them here in my room.”

 

“Very good Edith. And have you made anything lately?” Gerald persists. “A new frock, perhaps?”

 

“Oh no, Sir.” Edith replies. “But I did make myself a lovely new white blouse with a Peter Pan collar******************* and black buttons a month ago now. I wear it on my days off quite a bit at the moment.”

 

“Well,” Lettice says breezily with a sigh. “That’s all very interesting, Edith, but Mr. Bruton and I have held you up and away from your chores long enough. You may go. We can serve ourselves since it’s just a casual cold luncheon for two today, so there is no need for you to wait table.”

 

“Yes, Miss. Very good, Miss.” Edith bobs another curtsey and scuttles away through the adjoining dining room and disappears through the green baize door that leads to the service area of the flat.

 

“Spoil sport.” Gerald mutters.

 

“I told you, Gerald.” Lettice repeats. “Edith isn’t for turning. When I get married, she’ll be coming with me.”

 

“I don’t think she’ll fancy being buried in the Wiltshire Downs, Lettice darling.”

 

“Perhaps not, Gerald darling, but I think she’ll quite enjoy an elevated position as housekeeper of John’s and my Belgravia townhouse after I become Lady Nettleford-Hughes.”

 

“You are positively Machiavellian sometimes, Lettice darling.” Gerald concedes in defeat as he proffers Lettice his arm.

 

The two walk out of the Cavendish Mews drawing room and into the dining room, where a cold luncheon of galantine of fowl******************** with a fresh garden salad await them on the dining room table.

 

*Papyrus paper is called papyrus, named after the Cyperus papyrus plant from which it is made. The word "papyrus" itself refers to both the plant and the writing material created from its stems. Documents written on this material are also referred to as papyri.

 

**Portobello Road Market in Notting Hill, London, is a world-famous street market known for its antiques, vintage clothing, and diverse food stalls. It's one of London's oldest markets, dating back to the Nineteenth Century. The market stretches along Portobello Road, from Westbourne Grove to Golborne Road, and is particularly vibrant on Saturdays.

 

***Historically, queer slang emerged as a way for queer people to communicate discreetly, forming a sense of community and shared identity. Using female names or terms could be a way to signal belonging within this coded language. It was also used for protection, allowing homosexual men to talk about one another discreetly in public without the implication of homosexuality and the repercussions that came with it as a criminal act.

 

****Tutmania was a worldwide media frenzy and cultural obsession that followed the 1922 discovery of King Tutankhamun's tomb by Howard Carter and his team, sparking a popular fad for ancient Egyptian art, design, and culture in the Western world and a resurgence of national pride in Egypt itself. Egyptian motifs appeared on clothes, jewellery, hairstyles, fabrics, furniture and in architecture, and it helped solidify the Art Deco movement of design with its clean lines. The discovery of the tomb itself was one of the most significant archaeological finds of the Twentieth Century, made the previously lesser-known pharaoh one of the most famous figures in history.

 

*****Gaiety Girls were the chorus girls in Edwardian musical comedies, beginning in the 1890s at the Gaiety Theatre, London, in the shows produced by George Edwardes.

 

******‘Chu Chin Chow’ is a musical comedy written, produced and directed by Oscar Asche, with music by Frederic Norton, based on the story of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. It was the most popular show in London’s West End during the Great War. It premiered at His Majesty’s Theatre in London on the 3rd of August 1916 and ran for 2,238 performances, a record number that stood for nearly forty years!

 

*******Gypsophila, known commonly as Baby’s Breath, is a genus of flowering plants in the carnation family. They are native to Eurasia, Africa, Australia, and the Pacific Islands. Turkey has a particularly high diversity of Gypsophila, with about thirty-five endemic species. Some Gypsophila are introduced species in other regions.

 

********Laissez-faire is the policy of leaving things to take their own course, without interfering.

 

*********‘Floral Symbolica; or, The Language and Sentiment of Flowers’ is a book written by John Ingram, published in London in 1870 by Frederick Warne and Co. who are perhaps best known for publishing the books of Beatrix Potter. ‘Flora Symbolica; or, The language and Sentiment of Flowers’ includes meanings of many species of flowers, both domestic and exotic, as well as floral poetry, original and selected. It contains a colour frontispiece and fifteen colour plates, printed in colours by Terry. John Henry Ingram (November the 16th, 1842 – February the 12th, 1916) was an English biographer and editor with a special interest in Edgar Allan Poe. Ingram was born at 29 City Road, Finsbury Square, Middlesex, and died at Brighton, England. His family lived at Stoke Newington, recollections of which appear in Poe's works. J. H. Ingram dedicated himself to the resurrection of Poe's reputation, maligned by the dubious memoirs of Rufus Wilmot Griswold; he published the first reliable biography of the author and a four-volume collection of his works.

 

**********We usually associate the term “to keep mum” with the Second World War, when it was a byline used on posters to dissuade gossip and the inadvertent sharing of vitally confidential for the war effort with fifth-columnists. However, the word "mum" meaning to be silent, not to speak, first appeared in William Langland's Fourteenth Century poem Piers Plowman, though the full phrase "mum's the word" gained popularity in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth centuries. The word itself is onomatopoeic, derived from the "mmm" sound made by a closed mouth.

 

***********French blue is a sophisticated, deep blue colour that is characterized by its muted quality, subtle violet or grey undertones, and a rich, smoky depth, reminiscent of classical French design, the Mediterranean sky, or the deep blue uniforms of historical French soldiers.

 

************Bakelite, was the first plastic made from synthetic components. Patented on December 7, 1909, the creation of a synthetic plastic was revolutionary for its electrical nonconductivity and heat-resistant properties in electrical insulators, radio and telephone casings and such diverse products as kitchenware, jewellery, pipe stems, children's toys, and firearms. A plethora of items were manufactured using Bakelite in the 1920s and 1930s.

 

*************Le Bienvenue is the former name of L'Escargot, which is London's oldest French restaurant. Georges Gaudin opened Le Bienvenue at the bottom of Greek Street in Soho in 1896. He became famous for serving snails, and was reportedly the first in England to do so. Le Bienvenue even featured a snail farm in its basement, a unique talking point for customers. In 1927, two years after this story is set, Gaudin moved to larger premises at 48 Greek Street, the current location, in a Georgian townhouse built in 1741 which was once the private residence of the Duke of Portland and a pastoral getaway in what was then a rural part of London. When he moved, patrons of the restaurant encouraged him to rename it after his most popular dish, leading to the name L'Escargot.

 

**************Fair Isle is a traditional knitting style used to create patterns with multiple colours. It is named after Fair Isle, one of the Shetland Islands. Fair Isle knitting gained popularity when the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII) wore Fair Isle jumpers in public in 1921. Traditional Fair Isle patterns have a limited palette of five or so colours, use only two colours per row, are worked in the round, and limit the length of a run of any particular colour.

 

***************The term "trollop" was introduced in the early 1600s, with the earliest known evidence of its use appearing in the writings of George Wither in 1615. The term, a noun, was already established in the English language by that time.

 

****************The Wiltshire Times and Trowbridge Advertiser is weekly newspaper which serves the towns of west Wiltshire, including Trowbridge. Printed in Trowbridge it was established in 1854 by Benjamin Lansdown, as The Trowbridge and Wiltshire Advertiser. Benjamin was born in Trowbridge and was the son of a woollen mill employee but this was not the path he wished to follow and he was apprenticed as a printer alongside Mr John Sweet. He bought a hard press and second-hand typewriter before starting his own newspaper, along with establishing his own stationery shop in Silver Street around 1860. He moved the business into 15 Duke Street around 1876. Duke Street became home to the impressive R. Hoe & Co printing press that allowed printers to use continuous rolls of paper, instead of individual sheets, to speed up the process and countless copies of the newspaper rolled off the press at Duke Street for many years. The newspaper was based there for more than one hundred years and the business remained within the Lansdown family for generations until it was finally sold in the early 1960s. Over the years in had various names including The Trowbridge and North Wiltshire Advertiser from 1860 until 1880, The Wiltshire Times and Trowbridge Advertiser from 1880 until 1949, The Wiltshire Times between 1950 and 1962 and The Wiltshire Times & News between 1962 and 1963. It then became known as the Wiltshire Times – the banner it holds today. In 2019, the Wiltshire Times and its sister paper the Gazette & Herald moved to offices on the White Horse Business Park in North Bradley, stating that its Duke Street building was no longer fit for purpose. These offices later closed in 2020 as the three Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns struck. The Wiltshire times is still serving the local community both in a paper and an online format with a small team of journalists who passionately believe in the value of good trusted journalism and providing in-depth local news coverage.

 

****************The term to be “in trade” most commonly means engaging in commercial activity, such as regularly buying, selling, or offering goods or services as part of a business. It can also refer to the goods themselves (stock-in-trade) kept by a business for sale, or a characteristic skill or behaviour consistently used in a particular line of work. Used as a slur by the British upper-classes, “in trade” implied that because a man had to work for his living, even if he was a steel magnate or something equally successful, he was not as good as, and would never be a gentleman, who traditionally did not work to earn money. Money and money talk was considered vulgar by the upper-classes. A man who was “in trade” would never marry the daughter of an aristocrat or member of the landed gentry.

 

*****************‘They All Walk the Wibbly Wobbly Walk’ is a song written by Paul Pelham and J. P. Long sung by the famous British music hall performer Mark Sheridan in 1912. It was a song often sung during the Great War, and associated by the British general public with the survivors of the conflict who trembled due to shell shock or had misshapen walks thanks to injuries inflicted upon them.

 

******************A charwoman, chargirl, or char, jokingly charlady, is an old-fashioned occupational term, referring to a paid part-time worker who comes into a house or other building to clean it for a few hours of a day or week, as opposed to a maid, who usually lives as part of the household within the structure of domestic service. In the 1920s, chars usually did all the hard graft work that paid live-in domestics would no longer do as they looked for excuses to leave domestic service for better paying work in offices and factories.

 

*******************A Peter Pan collar is a style of clothing collar, flat in design with rounded corners. It is named after the collar of Maude Adams's costume in her 1905 role as Peter Pan, although similar styles had been worn before this date. Peter Pan collars were particularly fashionable during the 1920s and 1930s.

 

********************A galantine of fowl is a traditional French cold dish made from a deboned fowl, typically chicken, which is stuffed with a forcemeat (a mixture of ground meats and other ingredients), then rolled into a cylindrical shape, and poached in stock. It is served cold, often coated in a clear, gelatinous aspic, and can be elaborately decorated with ingredients like pistachios, truffles, and vegetables.

 

This 1920s upper-class drawing room is different to what you may think at first glance, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The boxed and unboxed Egyptian papyrus scrolls you see on Lettice’s black japanned coffee table are 1:12 size miniature made by the British miniature artisan Ken Blythe. Famed for his books, Ken Blythe also made other miniature artisan pieces from paper, including these scrolls, which can be fully wound out to reveal Egyptian hieroglyphics. To make a pieces as authentic as this makes them true artisan pieces. Most of the Ken Blythe books I own that he has made may be opened to reveal authentic printed interiors. In some cases, you can even read the words of the titles, depending upon the size of the print! I have quite a large representation of Ken Blythe’s work in my collection. What might amaze you even more is that all Ken Blythe’s opening books are authentically replicated 1:12 scale miniatures of real volumes. Ken Blythe’s work is highly sought after by miniaturists around the world today and command high prices at auction for such tiny pieces, particularly now that he is no longer alive. I was fortunate enough to acquire pieces from Ken Blythe prior to his death about four years ago, and a great many pieces from his daughter from his estate. His legacy will live on with me and in my photography which I hope will please his daughter.

 

Lettice’s tea set sitting on the coffee table is a beautiful artisan set featuring a rather avant-garde Art Deco Royal Doulton design from the Edwardian era called “Falling Leaves”.

 

Lettice’s drawing room is furnished with beautiful J.B.M. miniatures. The Art Deco tub chairs are of black japanned wood and have removable cushions, just like their life sized examples.

 

The fireplace is a 1:12 miniature resin Art Deco fireplace which is flanked by brass accessories including an ash brush with real bristles.

 

The carpet beneath the furniture is a copy of a popular 1920s style Chinese silk rug, and the geometric Art Deco wallpaper is beautiful hand impressed paper given to me by a friend, which inspired the whole “Cavendish Mews – Lettice Chetwynd” series.

Done