A Quiver Full of Arrows

“Last time you called me ‘silly woman’ you meant it.”

William found it natural that they should hold hands as they walked along the river bank. Neither spoke until they reached Somerville.

“What time shall I pick you up?” he asked, not letting go of her hand.

“I didn’t know you had a car.”

“My father presented me with an old MG when I was awarded a first. I have been longing to find some excuse to show the damn thing off to you. It has a press button start, you know.”

“Obviously he didn’t want to risk waiting to give you the car on the Charles Oldham results.” William laughed more heartily than the little dig merited.

“Sorry,” she said. “Put it down to habit. I shall look forward to seeing if you drive as appallingly as you write, in which case the journey may never come to any conclusion. I’ll be ready for you at ten.”

* * *

On the journey down to Hampshire, Philippa talked about her father’s work as a parish priest and inquired after William’s family. They stopped for lunch at a pub in Winchester. Rabbit stew and mashed potatoes.

“The first meal we’ve had together,” said William.

No sardonic reply came flying back; Philippa simply smiled.

After lunch they traveled on to the village of Brockenhurst. William brought his car to an uncertain halt on the gravel outside the vicarage. An elderly maid, dressed in black, answered the door, surprised to see Miss Philippa with a man. Philippa introduced Annie to William and asked her to make up the spare room.

“I’m so glad you’ve found yourself such a nice young man,” remarked Annie later. “Have you known him long?”

Philippa smiled. “No, we met for the first time yesterday.”

Philippa cooked William dinner, which they ate by a fire he had made up in the front room. Although hardly a word passed between them for three hours, neither was bored. Philippa began to notice the way William’s untidy fair hair fell over his forehead and thought how distinguished he would look in old age.

The next morning, she walked into the church on William’s arm and stood bravely through the funeral. When the service was over William took her back to the vicarage, crowded with the many friends the parson had made.

“You mustn’t think ill of us,” said Mr. Crump, the vicar’s warden, to Philippa. “You were everything to your father and we were all under strict instructions not to let you know about his illness in case it should interfere with the Charles Oldham. That is the name of the prize, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” said Philippa. “But that all seems so unimportant now.”

“She will win the prize in her father’s memory,” said William.

Philippa turne

d and looked at him, realizing for the first time that he actually wanted her to win the Charles Oldham.

They stayed that night at the vicarage and drove back to Oxford on Thursday. On Friday morning at ten o’clock William returned to Philippa’s college and asked the porter if he could speak to Miss Jameson.

“Would you be kind enough to wait in the Horsebox, sir,” said the porter as he showed William into a little room at the back of the lodge and then scurried off to find Miss Jameson. They returned together a few minutes later.

“What on earth are you doing here?”

“Come to take you to Stratford.”

“But I haven’t even had time to unpack the things I brought back from Brockenhurst.”

“Just do as you are told for once; I’ll give you fifteen minutes.”

“Of course,” she said. “Who am I to disobey the next winner of the Charles Oldham? I shall even allow you to come up to my room for one minute and help me unpack.”

The porter’s eyebrows nudged the edge of his cap but he remained silent, in deference to Miss Jameson’s recent bereavement. Again it surprised William to think that he had never been to Philippa’s room during their three years. He had climbed the walls of all the women’s colleges to be with a variety of girls of varying stupidity but never with Philippa. He sat down on the end of the bed.

“Not there, you thoughtless creature. The maid has only just made it. Men are all the same, you never sit in chairs.”