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Episode 3 || 14 October 1979 || Synopsis || Old Country Wisdom || Manor Trivia


Third episode of Series 1 (seven episodes)
From The Times: "Richard DeVere, otherwise Bedrich Polouvicka, fails to attend church on his first Sunday as the new lord of the manor, so Audrey decides to remind him of his duties."

 
R I C H A R D:
"But I'm not religious."
 
A U D R E Y:
"Religion doesn't come into it."

"Spring is almost upon us," notes Marjory at the end of Sunday services. But Richard, who has now been at Grantleigh for a week, is noted for his absence. The rector hopes DeVere knows that, as lord of the manor, he is church warden and chairman of the church council; Audrey, predictably, immediately takes it upon herself to point out to Richard the duties he is shirking. For beginners, she has been called upon to read the lesson in church, and she has a laundry list of other complaints about his stewardship as well.

Presenting herself at the manor, her worst fears are confirmed when she is welcomed by a pajamed DeVere, still rubbing the sleep from his eyes, who first mistakes her for the paper carrier and then offers her a mug of instant coffee. Audrey, scandalised, tells him that it is past 11 o'clock. "Is it?" DeVere asks. "I didn't realise it was that early." While he reads the Observer, Audrey launches into a scathing accounting of Richard's shortcomings, ranging from the fact that the lake is full of stolen supermarket trolleys to his nonattendance at church. "But I'm not religious," Richard says mildly. "Religion doesn't come into it," retorts Audrey.

Further troubles await Audrey at the lodge. Ned, called in to diagnose the long-case clock ("It bings when it should bong," Audrey says, "and generally sounds very unhappy"), pronounces the Webster a "hospital case" and will have to take it away for repair. Marjory is dubious of Ned's skill with clocks, but, Audrey says, "If you don't give him the work, he'll never get better." She relates the contents of her discussion with DeVere, telling Marjory that she does have an ally in her plan to remake Richard in a more acceptable image: his mother. "She's not one of us, of course, and never will be," notes Audrey, but Mrs Polouvicka wants to be well thought of locally.

Audrey's post-church outrage is matched by Mrs Polouvicka, who scolds Richard soundly for entertaining a lady is such a fashion. Richard is unimpressed: "I didn't move in here to be badgered by all and sundry," he grumbles. But Audrey is not all and sundry, his mother insists. "She has got roots. All you've got is money." She orders him upstairs for a bath and shave.

Audrey, meanwhile, has moved on to another bone of contention: her suddenly diminished social status. The only invitations she now receives, she says, include "an offer to solve my drain problem" (which she refused). "To think that I won't be going to Glynbourne this year," she laments. "I did so enjoy it-- apart from having to sit through those interminable operas."

Richard's mother's admonitions stir him to get dressed and take a stroll around the estate, where he encounters Ned ("First it were young Ned, then it were just Ned, now it's old Ned," he says) filling potholes. "Sounds like rain," observes Ned. "How can you tell?" Richard asks. "No, don't tell me. Clouds. Bird formation? Cows lying down? No-- you said it sounds like rain. I know: you heard it on the wind." "No sir," says Ned. "Heard it on the weather forecast this morning."

Richard next discovers Audrey on the bridge, playing Pooh-sticks. "Why is it, when we've got a thousand acres in which to ignore each other, do we end up in the same square yard?" she demands. She tells Richard that she's "trying to fix the estate in my memory in its ideal form, before it goes to wrack and ruin." Still, she invites Richard to play Pooh-sticks--and promptly accuses him of cheating. "Typical," she says. "Not only do you miss church and fail in all your other duties, but you cheat at Pooh-sticks." But her tirade is cut short by the sight of workmen hauling supermarket trolleys out of the lake. "Your first act as a farmer," she notes. "No," says Richard, "my last as a grocer. We needed the trolleys." A sudden shower forces them to make a dash for it. "Your place or mine?" Richard asks. "Mine," says Audrey-- and promptly sets off for the manor. "Force of habit," she admits.

Richard tries to reassure her on his plans for the estate; "with me in charge, everything will be in its place. The sheep in the meadow. The cows in the corn." "That's what I'm afraid of, Mr DeVere," Audrey says. "The cows shouldn't be in the corn." Richard asks for a "political honeymoon," a period of adjustment in which he can rely on Audrey's help rather than her bickering. "I may not be what you want for the manor, but you're not altogether what I need as a neighbour. But we're stuck with each other." Before Audrey can gather her forces to respond to this, Richard springs a dinner invitation. Audrey, pleasantly taken aback, accepts-- if Richard will accompany her to church on Sunday.

 
A U D R E Y:
"To think that Grantleigh is in the hands of a man who has no interest in farming, doesn't go to church and now, it turns out, has never heard of Winnie the Pooh. You think A.A. Milne is a motoring organisation, I suppose."
"I've got her in the palm of my hand," Richard tells his mother, as they await Audrey's arrival for dinner. Not entirely; Audrey is late. When she finally arrives, she notes that it's polite to be 20 minutes late. Richard points out that she is, in fact, 40 minutes late. "I'm just doubly polite," she says. Despite a brief skirmish on the use of the King James Bible rather than the New English ("I object to hearing my favourite stories read out in civil-service jargon," Audrey sniffs), dinner apparently goes well: Audrey returns to the lodge in excellent humour as the newly-repaired clock strikes 1. Brabinger is still awake, and inquires if Audrey managed to put Richard "right on a few things." "Now you be careful what you say about Mr DeVere, Brabinger," Audrey scolds. "I've heard some very unkind and unjust things said about him in this house." "But I never said a word against him, Madame, ever," protests Brabinger. "Maybe, but you have listened," Audrey says. "I want no more of it."
Come the morning, Audrey sets off for church, checking her watch and the foyer clock--only to find upon her arrival that services are over. Richard is waiting for her; "You stood me up," he says. "There's always one, on the morning the clocks go forward," says the rector. Richard can't resist the opportunity to needle Audrey: "I'll bet this is the first time in 400 years there hasn't been a fforbes-Hamilton in church." Audrey, however, is having none of it. "That's just where you're wrong, Mr DeVere," she says. "If you had looked carefully, you'd have seen that the church is absolutely stuffed with fforbes-Hamiltons."

  • "He who sits on the highest pinnacle still sits on his own backside."

 

  • The lesson that Audrey chooses for Richard to read is Matthew 19: "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of god."
  • Mrs Polouvicka notes that the church was built in 1366.


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