COUNTRY MOUSE

Mrs. Appleyard is back -- in the light, slight, amusingly pleasant social-romantic comedy, and as a very omnipresent dea ex machine in numerous affairs of the heart. It is her notion that culture-seeking Mrs. Hunter and Mrs. Carmody should pursue their search in Vermont, running Roland Hill as an art center. The particular storm in this small terpot of writers, musicians, artists, is Lady Finchfallow, an English relative and refuges, whose title carries no wealth. She attracts all males, detracts from all females, uses all feline devices to make trouble between lovers, is taken in by a bogus Englishman purporting to be a great friend of her presumably dead husband. It is Mrs. Appleyard who keeps Lady Finchfallow in her place, tosses off one wedding and unlooses a veritable non-stop nuptial flight, complete with long deferred reunions...Don't be surprised if this seems familiar -- it's the Thirkell in it, the assembling of delightfully unimportant trivia, the collection of sharply etched incidents, the assemblage of friendly recognizable characters. But being thoroughly American, it does not belong to the school of polite understatement, of snob appeal, and it has a more vigorous bounce than Thirkell achieves. It's our kind of fun -- and fun it is.