II
Looking into the kitchen with a word of admonition, Lanscombe was snapped at by Marjorie, thecook. Marjorie was young, only twenty-seven, and was a constant irritation¹ to Lanscombe as beingso far removed from what his conception of a proper cook should be. She had no dignity and noproper appreciation² of his, Lanscombe’s, position. She frequently called the house “a proper oldmausoleum” and complained of the immense area of the kitchen, scullery and larder³, saying that itwas a “day’s walk to get round them all.” She had been at Enderby two years and only stayedbecause in the first place the money was good, and in the second because Mr. Abernethie hadreally appreciated her cooking. She cooked very well. Janet, who stood by the kitchen table,refreshing herself with a cup of tea, was an elderly housemaid who, although enjoying frequentacid disputes with Lanscombe, was nevertheless usually in alliance with him against the youngergeneration as represented by Marjorie. The fourth person in the kitchen was Mrs. Jacks⁴, who“came in” to lend assistance where it was wanted and who had much enjoyed the funeral.
“Beautiful it was,” she said with a decorous sniff⁵ as she replenished⁶ her cup. “Nineteen cars andthe church quite full and the Canon read the service beautiful, I thought. A nice fine day for it, too.
Ah, poor dear Mr. Abernethie, there’s not many like him left in the world. Respected by all, hewas.”
There was the note of a horn and the sound of a car coming up the drive, and Mrs. Jacks putdown her cup and exclaimed: “Here they are.”
Marjorie turned up the gas under her large saucepan of creamy chicken soup. The large kitchenrange of the days of Victorian grandeur⁷ stood cold and unused, like an altar to the past.
The cars drove up one after the other and the people issuing from them in their black clothesmoved rather uncertainly across the hall and into the big green drawing room. In the big steel gratea fire was burning, tribute to the first chill of the autumn days and calculated to

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