Hens Dancing Page 16

  Simon has evidently been alerted to the drama, and his sympathy has manifested itself in a brace of partridge and an invitation for Giles to come beating. A bowl of soup and a bottle of white wine and Vivienne’s un-ruffleable presence are great healers. Gradually, Charles and Helena recede until, by teatime, their significance is the size of Mrs Pepperpot and we are giggling over Simon’s latest business venture: wormeries.

  October 5th

  Have become housewifely and apron-wearing in the extreme since The News. Begin to make blackberry and apple jelly, hypnotising Giles and Felix with the sinister sight in the kitchen of an oozing cloth hanging by strings and Rags’s lead from the beam while wine-dark drips of juice splash into a bowl on the table beneath it.

  ‘Cool. Has it got a severed head in it?’ whispers Felix, walking around it, almost brushing it with his nose. Giles cuffs him across the shoulder. He shrieks melodramatically and falls over, and Giles puts one foot on his chest and grins down at him.

  ‘It looks berry heavy, though, doesn’t it?’ he says.

  Felix rolls under the table, screeching with laughter and repeating, ‘Berry heavy. Berry heavy.’

  What a pair of halfwits. Sudden tears spring, causing frantic washing-up, as reality of my role as provider and protector overpowers. Will Charles cease to love them now? How could he?

  Am making quince jelly as well as blackberry, and by mid-afternoon it is plain that I have taken on Too Much. Pans of melted sugar everywhere, furry, fragrant quinces rolling about the floor, until retrieved by Giles who takes three outside to juggle with. Finally pour the blackberry and apple goo into pots. All my efforts have amounted to a paltry one and a half tiny pots of the jelly. Gaze disgusted at the results of my labours in scabby-looking jars with half their old labels still unbudging. Total waste of time, sugar and fruit. Would be cheaper to buy gold-leaf jelly (if it exists) from Fortnum’s, and more enjoyable.

  October 6th

  Rose telephones late to discuss Charles and Helena. Am still mad on housewifery, and battling with EU-sized quince mountain. Still hundreds of them lying, as if part of a Renaissance painting, on a vast red ashet, glowing yellow and amber and softly sensual. I love them, and don’t care that they are filthy to eat and useless for anything but jelly. And sponge pudding. Mmmmm. Better not, the children will hate it; I will have to eat it all. Not slimming.

  ‘I have news for you,’ says Rose, ‘big news. Are you sitting down?’

  Have come to my own conclusions, and try them out on Rose. ‘Do you think the poison dwarf had an affair?’

  ‘No, you idiot. Haven’t you worked it out? She’s done IVE’

  The quince jelly chooses this moment to burst out of its pan and slurp across the Aga. More like a B-movie than a Renaissance painting now, it creeps down the Aga and onto the floor, dragging the usual acrid billows of smoke and stench with it. Yank the telephone across to find a cloth, knocking a chair over, unable to leave Rose for a second.

  ‘How do you know? Are you sure? Whose babies are they, then?’

  ‘They belong to her and a sperm bank, I suppose. I don’t know, but it’s definitely true. Henry Loden told Tristan that she and Charles are over the moon. Apparently she’s been trying for ages.’

  In the inferno of my kitchen, on hands and knees with a wet cloth, a sticky telephone and surrounded by amber jelly, I reach my lowest moment.

  October 7th

  Three autumn-flowering cyclamen are peeping through fallen leaves beneath the beech tree and a pot of candy-pink Nerine have been left on the front doorstep with no card. Or maybe there was one and it blew away. The American hurricane, which was booked for an appearance two weeks ago, has arrived in East Anglia, late but forceful. The hens are most upset and fed up with having their feathers ruffled, so they have stopped laying any eggs and are sulking beneath the yew chicken, making random food runs to the back door whenever it is opened.

  October 8th

  The Beauty and I take a flask and sandwiches and drive onto the edge of the rugby pitch at Giles’s school in order to watch him in the first match of the season. A terrible mistake.

  ‘Rugby isn’t really a game for mothers,’ comments Giles’s games master, as a boy from the opposing school is taken off the pitch on a stretcher, teeth clenched, tears spilling down dappled purple cheeks, bravely hiding the pain of a twisted knee and a thigh trampled over by metal-studded boots. Giles has the ball and is thundering towards the touchline for a few glorious seconds before a giant beefcake, supposedly also under eleven years old, but weighing at least nine stone, knocks him flying. I scream inadvertently and leap out of the car, longing to run onto the pitch. In a moment, though, Giles has crawled out from a pile of vast boys and is himself grabbing someone around the waist and hurling them to the ground.

  ‘They’ve scored three tries and made two conversions. They’re doing really well.’ Mr Jensen the dentist materialises at my side; his son is also playing.

  ‘What’s a conversion?’ I ask without wishing to know, and drift off as he explains. Am greatly comforted by the professional presence at the match: among the parents watching today there is a doctor, two lawyers and Mr Jensen. All we need now is an ambulance driver and every eventuality is covered. The Beauty has turned on the car stereo and is dancing on the driver’s seat, taking a hostess’s role when parents pass her.

  ‘Helloo, helloo,’ she warbles to them, waving her hand to communicate that she would like them to pass on to the other end of the pitch while she finishes her telephone call. She has a calculator, picked up from the floor of the car, clamped like a telephone to her ear, ‘Byeee,’ she shrieks, slamming it down on the dashboard before rushing after her guests on the field.

  The final whistle blows and the boys line up to shake hands. Giles approaches, grinning and mud-spattered, as if he is auditioning for a soap-powder commercial.

  ‘Mum, we won twenty-nine to ten and I scored a try. James Lascelles scored one too, and Tom Jensen got a conversion.’

  He is inured to my ignorance now, and always gives me a quick debriefing on the game on the way back to tea so I don’t embarrass him when chatting to masters and other parents about it. Wish they didn’t change the game every term; just as I think I have got the hang of one – cricket, for example – they have all switched to hockey or rugby and I have no hope of knowing what’s going on. This term’s mystery item is studs. Giles needs some safety studs. How does one come by such things, and how does one know that they are needed in the first place? And anyway, what are they?

  ‘Oh, I’ve got a bag of studs for Tom and he doesn’t need them all,’ says Mrs Jensen. ‘Giles can have some if he comes to the car to fetch them.’ Thus my ignorance is left intact and Giles achieves his studs. Maybe I will learn when Felix needs them.

  October 12th

  Gawain is coming to stay. He rings to deliver his verdict on Charles.

  ‘Must have cost him a bit to sort Helena out. Those Petri dish babies are a few grand. You’d better watch out that he doesn’t start defrauding Heavenly Petting and cutting down on alimony.’

  ‘Oh, he isn’t that bad, Gawain. He’s a good father.’

  Very odd to be protecting Charles. It seems to help maintain my new relaxed Just Don’t Care attitude, which is becoming more authentic every day. Off to the spare room to make it fit for a guest. This is always a fine work-avoidance scheme, and unlike washing-up or folding clothes, has novelty value. Open the door and discover it to be stuffed with numerous garments which were until now missing presumed lost. Had utterly forgotten that this was to be laundry room, and after initial enthusiasm for dumping piles of washing in here, have not been in for weeks. Tempted to throw all the clothes into the bin forthwith, as we have managed fine without them, but miserly instinct prevents me. Instead, put them back in piles dotted about the landing.

  Make bed, plumping pillows and so forth, trying to achieve magazine-like appearance of comfort and elegance in the room. All going well until I notice
the chair. Or rather, what is on the chair. A most antique cat poo in the shape of a question mark. There can be no doubt about whose it is. Sidney specialises in lavatorial humour in the spare room.

  ‘Bastard filthy cat, Sidney. God, how I loathe and despise you.’

  Rant around the room, venting spleen for a bit, then fetch rubber gloves and paper to clear it up. No need for either. The fossil comes away easily and is a worthy exhibit for the boys’ museum. Have usual guilt pangs at the thought of the museum: it is drastically underfunded, and so far has only a cigarette butt belonging to George Harrison (courtesy of Rose and Tristan who met him and snatched it from the floor where he dropped it) and a piece of cake with a bite out of it. The missing mouthful went down the Prince of Wales’s throat when he came to open a local old folks’ home. Felix, having watched His Royal Highness closely for signs of regality, whispered, ‘How do you know he’s real if he isn’t wearing a crown?’ but was convinced enough to put the cake in his napkin and smuggle it home.

  In the barn, which houses the museum, a house martin’s nest has been added to the exhibits. Remember David promising a glass case to the boys last time he was here. He has not been around for ages. Must ring him.

  October 13th

  Ring him. He has been in London, making furniture for film sets. Why is everyone else’s life more glamorous than mine? Even Digger went to London, where he enjoyed the dustbins hugely.

  ‘What have you been up to, Venetia?’ Some men’s voices are neither here nor there on the telephone; others achieve a richness and depth of timbre which brings out flirtation. David’s is one such voice. Find I am standing on one leg, winding the other around it and giggling.

  ‘Oh, nothing much.’ Cannot in fact think of anything at all I have done, except clear up cat shit. Catch sight of The Beauty on tiptoe, reaching for a flowerpot in the garden, and have to cut short the conversation.

  ‘Oh, come over any time, we’d love to see you. I must go. Bye, David.’

  ‘Bye, Venetia. I’ll fix up the glass case and bring it over at the weekend.’

  October 14th

  Purchase two hundred wallflower plants, rust and crimson according to the bundles they are in. Plant them along the front of the house. It takes all morning. Spend the afternoon worrying that it will look like a municipal roundabout when they all flower in the spring. But at least I remembered them this year. A sign of success for sure. Although I did forget to sow the seeds I bought in February. Oh well, there’s always next year.

  October 15th

  Power cut at teatime reminds me of the three-day week in the seventies. We still have the Aga, but Giles and Felix elect to make supper on the open fire anyway. We toast teacakes and wrap potatoes in foil and throw them in. Start gathering candles in the hall as night falls, and torches too. Hugely enjoy this, as Georgette Heyer often has meaningful interludes when the spirited heroine is handed her candle by a gorgeous Corinthian with whom she is involved in tempestuous dispute over something. Give an impromptu living history lesson by explaining to the boys that hundreds of years ago the family living here would all have met in the hall to be given their candle by the man of the house.

  ‘We haven’t got a man in our house,’ wails Felix, for whom the excitement is wearing off.

  ‘Oh, yes we have. Two, in fact,’ says Giles, who has run to the window on hearing a car. ‘David’s here and so is Gawain. Gawain’s getting out of David’s car. I didn’t know they were friends.’

  Our cosy firelit evening is abruptly invaded, and the peaceful pre-bath, post-tea house erupts in a chaos of stamping boots and voices and two tall, broad figures with the evening chill rising from their coats. David drops two of Gawain’s bags at the bottom of the stairs, and addresses me coldly.

  ‘Would you prefer me to make another date to do the museum? I imagine you would like to spend this weekend in peace with your guest.’ He appraises Gawain. ‘I saw him at the station, and he asked me how to get here, so I offered him a lift.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I reply. ‘Presumably you’ve introduced yourselves to one another. Gawain is Felix’s godfather.’ Why should David be interested? Oh, well.

  Gawain wraps me in a bear-hug. ‘Good to see you, gorgeous. How’s the gang?’ He has brought Felix a longed-for PlayStation, and is as desperate as Felix is to get it up and running. Try to tell him about the electricity, but he ignores me, and despite having to take a candle, remains touchingly oblivious as he heads up to Felix’s room with a huge box of computer leads under his arm. ‘We’ll be going places with this any moment now. Let’s hit the controls, Felix.’

  Such is Felix’s excitement at this longed-for moment that he too has forgotten about the power. Giles and I roll our eyes to heaven and sit down again by the fire.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it.’ David extracts himself from The Beauty, and her game on the rocking horse with him, and stands up to go.

  ‘Oh, not yet,’ pleads Giles. ‘Come and see how we’ve got on with the tree house since you were last here. It’s brilliant.’

  David’s protests are brushed aside and Giles drags him into the dusk. A moment of quiet, then Felix and Gawain erupt into the drawing room through another door, Gawain hopping with excitement and reminding me of Tigger in Winnie-the-Pooh.

  ‘God, Venetia, this is so primitive. There’s no electricity. How long has it been like this? It’s great.’ Gawain throws himself down on the sofa and opens a can of Red Stripe which he pulls from his pocket. ‘Where’s that guy gone? I asked him in for a beer to say thanks for bringing me, but he said he knew you anyway and was on his way here.’

  ‘He’s with Giles, outside.’

  Firelight and candles suffuse the room with rosy, cosy glow. David and Giles finally come in again. Gawain leaps up to shake David’s hand.

  ‘Listen, I’ve twisted Venetia’s arm. We want you to stay and have supper.’

  David’s brows swoop up. He looks at me, hardly smiling.

  ‘How cosy, but I’m afraid—’

  ‘Oh, please stay. Please, David. It won’t be fun without you.’ Giles and Felix drag him onto the sofa, and laughing, he takes off his coat and agrees.

  ‘I wish we never had electricity, it’s much more fun,’ says Felix when he is finally dragged up to bed, adding, with glorious inconsistency, ‘Can David and Gawain stay so we can do the PlayStation tomorrow?’

  Seems to me that David and Gawain are unlikely to go anywhere. An hour with Gawain at his most bombastic has thawed David utterly, and exhausted me. They are playing poker, two candles in Wallace and Gromit candleholders illuminate the cards for them and the scene is deliciously rakish. David wins the first hand, and they are dealing again within seconds, scarcely aware of me as I begin to gather up plates, glasses and the ketchup bottle from the gloom beyond the firelight. Am light-headed with tiredness and with relief that David is here and I do not have to shoulder the burden of Gawain’s machine-gun energy. I slink off to bed as the first candle gutters and is replaced with another.

  October 16th

  Set off on a mushroom-picking expedition with my mother. Gawain carries The Beauty on his shoulders, earning himself thousands of brownie points with me because I can saunter along with a spring in my step as if I am seventeen, untrammelled by the pushchair or worse, the backpack. However, Gawain loses all the brownie points again as soon as we get into the woods. Forgetting The Beauty, he forges through hanging foliage. A terrible roar alerts me, and I turn to see The Beauty, peering red-faced from a frond of chestnut tree, her arms wrapped around it while her feet drum in frustration and fury on Gawain’s collarbone.

  ‘Ow, stop it. You can’t do that to me, I’m carrying you, for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘Don’t be such an idiot, Gawain, you’ll drop her.’

  I reach the sobbing Beauty as she is wrenched from her branch, and snatch her from Gawain. Scowling, he marches off into curling golden bracken where my mother is inspecting a fairy ring of fungus. Fury blasts my cheeks. I crouc
h to let The Beauty climb onto my back. She cannot. Making the most of a dramatic opportunity, she continues to sob woefully into my shoulder. We follow the others slowly, and her spirits lift with every sighting of Giles and Felix, now way ahead, dark blurs racing through the copper leaves, weaving between smooth grey beech trunks and moss-covered heaps of piled logs.

  October 21st

  It is Wednesday and Gawain is finally departing. He has not had a restful sojourn, but has survived. His relationship with The Beauty has deteriorated still further, and she will not now be in a room with him without bursting into tears. Am glad he is not her godfather, and that he lives miles away and will not be dropping in too often. He is a pitiful sight, leaning out of the train window to wave. Half of his face is hidden by reflecting sunglasses, but the bits above and below the shades are pale green and damp and spasms of trembling occupy him every few minutes. The doctor said this was to be expected, and that Gawain would be better within a week.

  It is all my mother’s fault. She administered a highly toxic mushroom in an omelette on Saturday night and poisoned him. For three days his life hung in the balance, or so it seemed from the fuss he made; the doctor said there was no danger at all.

  ‘I’m so glad you aren’t dead,’ were my mother’s bracing words when she came to view him in his sickbed. ‘You could be. I thought they were wood mushrooms, but I’ve looked them up and they’re yellow staining agarics, which are very similar but horribly toxic.’ Her smile was sepulchral. ‘I’m amazed it hasn’t happened before, actually.’

  Moderately contrite, she salved her conscience with a packet of orange and lemon cupcakes, presented, along with a half-bottle of vodka, to the invalid. Still too enfeebled and sensitive to look at them, he cringed away, shuddering. My mother ate all except the final orange-flavoured cake. This was given to The Beauty who was peering round the door, anxious that Granny might be in danger from the dreadful creature. My mother sipped briefly from the vodka bottle, then rose to leave.