Guppies for Tea Page 7

  ‘That’s right,’ Gerald turned, looking almost pleased, ‘bring that up, I knew you would, sooner or later.’

  Close to tears, Amelia said, ‘It’s like speaking to the Red Queen in Alice. I only meant that I agree, I don’t own you. And if I do mind you going it’s only because I would not want to go on holiday without you so maybe I’m just a little disappointed that you don’t feel the same.’ She wiped her eyes angrily with the sleeve of her sweat-shirt. ‘That’s all,’ she added lamely.

  On Sunday, Gerald left for his trip. He had spent most of the two previous days noisily carting rods and tins and boots from various parts of the house into the hall. They hadn’t spoken much, other than for the purpose of getting on with daily life. Amelia had nursed the hope that her uncharacteristic silence would come to worry Gerald, but in the end she thought that he either liked it or hadn’t noticed. She carried on searching the housing pages of local papers for premises suitable for a tea-shop, and worked on the article on the introduction of multi-cultural assemblies in the local schools. ‘I’m particularly well qualified for that one,’ she muttered to herself as she watched Gerald search for his copy of Fly-fishing: Poetry in Motion. ‘Seeing as I’m a half-Swedish, half-English, Anglican Jew, living in an unorthodox relationship with a pig.’

  ‘What was that?’ Gerald turned to her with a really friendly smile and Amelia, feeling instantly ashamed, smiled back. ‘Nothing, nothing at all. Possessiveness really is an ugly trait, she thought. So she added, ‘I hope the fish bite.’

  ‘Where?’ Gerald asked, making her laugh.

  His goodbye kiss was surprisingly warm, especially considering he had a suitcase in one hand and two fishing rods in the other. ‘Was it Friday you were going down to Cherryfield?’ he asked. ‘I like to know where I can reach you.’

  ‘You take care,’ he called from the open car window, raising his arm in a salute as he drove off. And it seemed to Amelia, as she stood waving by the front door, that the car leapt out of the drive like a spring lamb sighting green pasture.

  Chapter Eight

  Amelia Closed the front door behind Gerald, straightened her shoulders and decided to make good use of the time he was away. In fact, she thought as she walked briskly through to her desk, it was no bad thing having a week to herself; she could finish the article, clear out her wardrobe, have lunch with a friend, even visit Selma.

  But each evening, as the shadows lengthened in the garden, like ghosts dragging their cloaks across the rose-beds, she felt lonely. It was as if she needed another living body around to assure her that she existed outside her own imagination.

  When she first moved with Gerald to Abbotslea she had dreamt of concerned vicars on the prowl for dry sherry and converts, of gossipy post-mistresses and nosy neighbours. She had always had a soft spot for nosy neighbours; they cared, she thought, but the village had turned out a disappointment. Pretty as a chocolate-box cover it may be, but there was a constant display of For Sale signs, standing like flag-poles, in front of the rose-covered cottages as the younger residents climbed up the housing ladder and the older ones, the nosy, gossipy, church-going ones, died off.

  True collectivism, Amelia thought, was to be found, not on a farm in Bulgaria, but amongst the older inhabitants of an English country village; ‘I’ve got a glut of broad beans this season, you have some and I wouldn’t say no to a trug of that tasty looking beetroot.’ Signs in the village shop-window saying, ‘I’m off to town the first Thursday of every month and will have three spare seats in the car. Any one wanting a lift, stand at the disused bus stop on Main Street at eight-thirty.’

  But that was all going. It lay interred in the pretty churchyard on top of Vicarage Hill with the bones of old Mrs Craig, bossy Miss Payne and Major Stapleton, lately of the Royal Fusiliers. Behind them came the new-age villagers, blaming each other for the lack of village life as they boarded the seven-fifteen for London or, to be fair Amelia thought, stayed behind locked doors writing articles for the national press about the dissolution of the village spirit.

  As she sat on Wednesday evening watching six recorded episodes of Neighbours, her supper on a tray in front of her, Amelia thought she really was a true parasite. Without another human to feed off she began to function badly, becoming shrivelled of thought and pale of mind.

  She looked at the video, pushing forkfuls of the glutinous, cooling pasta around her plate. There was Cherryfield, beckoning in the distance like an old, painted tart: ‘Give me your cash and I’ll soon make you comfortable.’

  ‘And this,’ she said out loud, ‘is how I choose to spend the precious time until her arms close round me.’ As she spoke, she saw her words fanning out into the room, beetling along the skirting-board, across the sofa and chairs, searching for a listener, before returning to her in ribbon formation.

  That’s it, she thought, I’m going to bed.

  The next morning she opened her curtains to a sky that looked as if it had been painted by an artist with only one shade of dull, mid-grey at his disposal. After dressing, Amelia put the now-finished article in a brown, A4 envelope and, grabbing her handbag, went off to the village shop.

  It had stopped raining but a chill breeze made her button up her washed-out green puffa. She always wore the puffa in Abbotslea, it was a statement: I might live in sin with your family solicitor, it said, but at heart I’m a harmless and conventional creature. It was impossible, Amelia hoped, to be a threat and wear a puffa, both at the same time.

  As she reached The Stores, she heard her name called. Approaching from the opposite direction, pushing a pram, came Rosalind Hall, Amelia’s closest friend in the village. She was wearing a canary yellow sou’wester and round the huge wheels of the old carriage pram, the water splashed, throwing little glistening spears in every direction.

  Amelia waited for her, glad to find someone to chat to, although since the birth of little Ronald, Rosalind’s son, their friendship had lost its comfortable quality. Rosalind spent a good deal of the time apologizing for having a baby, whilst Amelia apologized for not having one.

  ‘Lucky you,’ Rosalind said now, not meaning it, ‘you can just put on your coat and march off. If you knew the time it took to get ready with a tiny.’

  Amelia refrained from asking, ‘Tiny what?’ Instead she told Rosalind sincerely that she longed to have someone holding her up.

  ‘Gerald seems very pleased with himself these days, what are you doing to him?’ Rosalind asked for something to say, as she smiled down at Ronald who showed his naked gums in an irresistible grin. ‘Who’s Mummy’s little man then?’ she cooed to him as she gently rocked the pram with her gumbooted foot.

  Amelia looked pleasantly surprised. ‘I didn’t think I was doing anything right as far as Gerald’s concerned. He’s not home at the moment, actually.’ Amelia sighed. ‘It’s ridiculous, he’s only away for a week, but I really miss him.’ As she spoke she bobbed up and down, trying to keep at eye-level with Rosalind whose head kept disappearing under the hood of the pram.

  Rosalind looked up with an indulgent smile. ‘If that’s what not being married does to a relationship, maybe Chris and I should go for divorce. I mean, London is only an hour away.’

  ‘What do you mean London is only an hour away?’

  Rosalind’s sou’wester appeared again. ‘I mean London is not a long distance away from Abbotslea.’ She spoke with the same practised patience she employed when speaking to little Ronald. ‘As I saw Gerald across the street from the Royal Academy – and you told me he was away for the week – and as childbirth has not completely addled my razor-sharp brain, I put two and two together and assumed London was where Gerald was. ‘We wanted to see the Monet exhibition.’ Rosalind’s head darted back under the hood and Amelia heard a muffled, ‘Didn’t we Ronnikins?’

  ‘Gerald was in London yesterday?’ Amelia’s main feeling was of stupidity. She saw Rosalind’s lips move, she heard the words they spoke, but she was damned if she understood. ‘Did you speak to h
im?’

  Rosalind was beginning to look impatient. ‘No, as a matter of fact, I didn’t. We just waved across the street. Yes, Mummy’s sausage waved to Mr Forbes, didn’t he?’

  ‘You’re sure it was Gerald?’

  Ronald let out a sudden, anguished wail. Rosalind looked at her watch as she loosened the break on the pram with a kick of the foot. ‘I didn’t go up to him and ask for his driving licence or genetically fingerprint him or anything, but it looked like Gerald to me. Now I really must get home and give Ronnie his elevenses, the poor little mite is starving.’

  For once, as she stepped inside the village shop, Amelia was pleased that it was no longer run by Wing Commander Stephens OBE AFC. He’d been a source of endless amusement to Amelia as he plied his trade, always fearful that in so doing he had come down in the world. His manner was chill towards anyone with a small child, an ice-cream or an address in the wrong part of the village and jovially officious to others. It was a manner that had sent most of the villagers into the anonymous comfort of the supermarket in nearby Alresford. Sometimes, Mrs Stephens would appear in check polyester overalls, and tell Amelia of their days attached to the Embassy in Peru, the glittering parties they gave, and the people they met. In the end though even the weekly Saturday sell-off of out-of-date stock couldn’t save the Wing Commander from the realities of supply and demand. When he finally sold up, the view of the village was that it had been only a matter of time until he was closed down by the health inspector anyway.

  The Stores had been taken over by a big-thinking young couple from a nearby village who were planning a chain of Mini-Marts. Whilst continuing to carry the usual stock: sweets and biscuits, tinned soups and rice-puddings, speciality cheeses and teas, they added frozen Weight-watcher meals, videos for hire and a sub-Post Office, and employed a girl for the newly installed check-out who displayed much the same attitude to her customers as a gardener to worms; as a breed they were necessary but on a one to one basis they had little to offer.

  In the old days, Amelia, who had won favour with the Wing Commander due to her pretty face and connections with the Forbeses and in spite of her short skirts and unorthodox relationship with the Forbes’ son, would have had to explain both Gerald’s business in being absent and her own glum face. As it was, she posted her envelope and bought her cheese and bread with the minimum communication needed for the transactions.

  ‘First class is it? That’ll be thirty-one pence,’ at the Post Office counter, and ‘Two pounds exactly, thank you,’ at the check-out.

  The rest of the morning, Amelia tried to make sense of what Rosalind had told her. She hated mysteries and uncertainties. They sent her into frenzied, ineffective action, like someone with a ceiling leaking in five places but only one bucket. First she called Gerald’s office to ask his father where Gerald was. She liked Norman and he was fond of her. She wouldn’t mind admitting to him that she had mislaid his son. But Norman was at a meeting and the secretary didn’t know where Mr Gerald Forbes could be reached, either. ‘Is this Miss Lindsay?’

  ‘No, no it isn’t,’ Amelia answered, suddenly talking at the front of her mouth, in a feeble attempt to disguise her voice.

  Next she telephoned Gerald’s friend Tom, who was meant to be on the trip. Only the answering machine was at home and, in the manner of those machines, gave little away other than that, ‘Tom can’t come to the phone right now …’

  She couldn’t call Nick, she didn’t have his number or address. She sat by the phone, trying to calm herself down. Gerald would be in touch. There was bound to be a reasonable explanation of why he’d been seen in the centre of London whilst on a fishing trip to Scotland. Gerald was nice. He didn’t lie. Any moment now he’d come through the door explaining that the trip had been cut short.

  He didn’t come home and there was no word from him that day, nor the next. Furious, fretting, with a feeling in her stomach as if her guts were being twisted like spaghetti round a fork, she sat at the kitchen table breathing deeply: in, out, in and out. She visualized herself as a giant boiling kettle with a cork stuffed down its spout, making it impossible for the steam to escape as the pressure was building (she had once attended relaxation classes with Dagmar). ‘Now remove that cork,’ she said to herself, her voice taking on a faint American accent. ‘Feel the steam just pouring out.’

  ‘Sod it!’ she screamed, as the vision was taking on a life of its own, with Amelia straddling the huge kettle, desperately wrestling with the cork. ‘Bloody hell, bloody, fucking hell!’ She stood up, yelling so her throat hurt, her fists pounding the air.

  That did help. Pacing the room, she stopped at the open window and leant out, breathing in the damp air.

  ‘Amelia, is that you?’ Mrs Jenkins from next door stood by the low stone wall. She was smiling, but it was rather a tight-lipped smile. ‘I thought I heard your voice.’

  ‘Mrs Jenkins, ah, yes … I was just rehearsing my lines for … for the Cherryfield Home for the Elderly’s summer play. They’re a pretty modern lot at Cherryfield.’ She gave a quick wave and dived out of sight.

  Twenty-four hours later, Amelia packed an overnight bag and, leaving a note for Gerald to contact her in case he arrived home before her, set off for Kingsmouth.

  Chapter Nine

  Selma Loved Plants. At Ashcombe they had surrounded her; green bodyguards in the drawing room, a scented, multicoloured fence outside. When she had first arrived, holding her small, white-faced daughter by the hand, she had walked outside on to the terrace in the moonlight. The camomile crushed under their feet had filled the air around them with its soporific scent, as she looked across the garden to a glimpse of the sea beyond.

  ‘Get away from me you bloody fool!’ As Amelia approached Cherryfield in the late afternoon, Selma’s voice reached her from the open first-floor window. Amelia, shocked at hearing her grandmother yell obscenities in much the same manner as she herself had done earlier that day, ducked to avoid a beige Scholl sandal flying straight at her.

  A potted begonia, tracing the path of the sandal, crashed at her feet, having narrowly missed her right temple. She could see no-one at the window until a uniformed arm appeared slamming it shut. Bending down again, she picked up the shoe from amid the soil and bits of shattered clay and brushed it off, before resuming her walk to the front door. She rang the bell, her cheeks reddening in anticipation of the telling off from Sister Morris. ‘I’m sure she didn’t mean to,’ she rehearsed. ‘She probably didn’t realize the window was open.’

  ‘Cooee! Amelia darling!’

  She took a step back to find that Selma had managed to open the window again and was leaning out, pink-cheeked and smiling. ‘What a lovely surprise. I’ll be right down, if …’ Her voice became laden with reproach as she turned into the room. ‘If I’m allowed to.’

  As Selma descended sideways in the chairlift, her chubby back straight, Amelia wondered if she should mention at least in passing that she had been almost knocked out by a potted plant, maybe even get Selma to give some kind of explanation that might satisfy the still absent Sister Morris. But her grandmother looked so normal, so happy to see her, that she said nothing.

  ‘If you could pass me that wretched thing,’ Selma said, pointing at the walking frame standing at the bottom of the stairs. Slowly, her hands, then her weight, were transferred to the frame, and Amelia followed her grandmother’s hesitant shuffling towards the conservatory. Now and then Selma would halt, forgetting to move one foot in front of the other, like a sick baby forgetting to breathe. Then with a little start, the shuffle would continue.

  ‘We’re doing ever so well on the frame now.’ Nurse Williams smiled approvingly at them as they passed in the lounge. There was no mention of the scene upstairs. ‘I told you Mrs M, didn’t I tell you, there’s no harm in trying, I said.’

  Amelia got Selma settled in a wicker armchair. She looked at her grandmother’s face, it looked such a small face all of a sudden, unsure, all fury spent. ‘Are you eating properl
y?’ she asked.

  ‘I get terribly bored with the food here,’ Selma said. ‘I much preferred it in the other place.’

  Amelia couldn’t bring herself to ask, ‘What other place?’ So she said nothing.

  ‘Of course I can’t wait until I’m back in my own kitchen.’ From having fussed with her handbag and the position of her sore foot, Selma suddenly looked directly at Amelia, ‘Play the game with me, please,’ her eyes seemed to say.

  ‘I’m sure you’re getting better every day,’ Amelia said sidling round the truth.

  ‘I won’t get better whilst I’m here,’ Selma insisted. She leant over as far as she could towards Amelia. ‘It’s a funny place. You can’t make any plans. You know, I don’t think I’ve had a swim in weeks.’ She leant back again, closing her eyes for a moment. ‘There are no animals here either.’

  Each visit, Amelia had dreaded Selma asking after the cats, but she never did, and it struck Amelia that Selma didn’t ask about lots of things because she was too frightened of the answers.

  ‘I only live for the moment when I can go back,’ Selma said matter of factly.

  Amelia felt her cheeks going hot. It was her turn to lean forward and she took Selma’s shaking hand between her own two and forced it still. ‘It won’t be long, I’m sure it won’t.’

  ‘Promise?’ Selma smiled.

  ‘Promise,’ said Amelia, feeling sick.

  Selma closed her eyes, and soon she was asleep, leaving Amelia pondering impossible schemes of how to fulfil that promise. Maybe, she thought tiredly, Selma would forget, like she forgot so much else.

  Amelia relaxed. Time, in the overheated room, seemed to float. There had been so many times when she’d sat watching Selma doze off in her chair after lunch. Selma had always been a great one for naps. ‘You stay here by me, darling,’ she’d say, sitting in the bay of the drawing room at Ashcombe, her chair turned towards the window and the view of the sea. ‘I’ll just close my eyes for a moment,’ and she would lean back and go to sleep in just this way. Selma loved the sea, the constantly changing scene from the window. She seemed to bear it no resentment for taking her first husband, Amelia’s real grandfather, away from her.