An Affair to Remember (10 page)

“My honey queen, what is the matter?” Sel puts an arm round his seething wife, she shakes it off.

“For Christ’s sake don’t talk to me about honey, that’s what started it.”

“What can you mean, my love? But before you tell us, let’s eat, I for one am starving.” They file into the Mexican dining room, where once long ago Harold Durlston and his cronies sipped their port, peering uncertainly at one another through the intricacies of the brand new silver epergne. Sel was right, the repast laid out on the big oak dining table is indeed simple: yogurt (natural of course), goat’s cheese, a few rock-like home-made rolls, a dish of olives, a bowl of nuts.

“Now, my pet, what is all this about honey?”

Clarrie bites into one of the rolls, and makes a face. “It seems that Mrs Bogg was furious when she found out we’d bought all that honey from Karen Warren’s granddad – you know Karen, she’s that frightful looking girl in Major Mallory’s shop.” At the mention of Major Mallory, Beatrice’s heart gives a lurch; she chokes over her home-made roll.

“Village jealousy at work, I see,” Sel munches his with apparent enjoyment, “but why should this upset our Juan, surely he has –?”

“Mrs Bogg attacked him about it, said he was getting a rake-off. I don’t actually think he knows what a rake-off is, but he obviously thought it was something fearfully rude. He just went on and on, I could have died, I really could. And of course with all this going on Mrs Bogg never had time to make any rolls, so these are yesterday’s.”

“So I suspected.”

“Anyway,” Clarrie, now well into her stride, continues, “Mrs Bogg started on at me too, and she was wearing that awful purple velvet hat, you know that one like the Queen used to wear years ago… And what’s so bloody funny? It’s alright for you, you don’t…” But Sel and Beatrice are too far gone to listen, tears of laughter streaming down their faces. For better or worse a bond had been forged between them.

And so, not unpleasantly, passed Beatrice’s first week at Brown End. The work was hard, sometimes demanding, but on the whole she enjoyed it and was too tired in the evenings to do anything but retire to her room and watch television. She made a couple of trips to the village, but saw no sign of Major Mallory; Karen Warren was in charge when she visited the shop, and she didn’t like to ask for him.

The weekend was not so good. Sel’s accountant and his wife came: both tall, thin and arrogant, they were introduced to her as Bertie and Gwen. In spite of the informal introduction, however, they pointedly ignored her for most of their stay, apart from Sunday morning when at the breakfast table Bertie tossed her a massive and complicated looking financial schedule. “Can you type this up, Beatrice, I’ll need it for a meeting on Monday. It looks worse than it is, so shouldn’t take you long.” Beatrice, who’d planned to spend the day exploring the surrounding countryside, had little option but to do his bidding.

“That new girl of Sel’s seems efficient,” she overheard Gwen comment on her to Clarrie on Sunday evening, “Bert says she can actually spell. So many of these girls nowadays, are absolutely bog standard. Bert says…” and they moved out of earshot. Stupid, arrogant, conceited cow! What had Syl said? ‘It isn’t really you is it, darling, running circles round some trendy?’ And as usual Syl was right: for a moment she had felt like some benighted, downtrodden Victorian governess.

“You didn’t much care for those two, did you, dear?” Beatrice jumps guiltily. Monday morning she’s at her office window watching with considerable relief the departure of Bertie and Gwen. Sel comes up behind her; gently massages her shoulders, it feels rather nice. “Don’t worry, I can’t stand them either, but he’s a bloody good accountant and, contrary to popular belief, such people do not grow on trees. Of the two I find Gwen marginally more of a bore. What do you think?”

“Please Sel, you’re making me feel like Jane Eyre. I have no opinions about your friends at all, I can’t have.”

“Don’t talk nonsense, and if you’re considering putting me down as some latter day Mr Rochester, don’t. I’m not the type. I mean can you see Edward Rochester presiding over such cultural feasts as
Find the Missing Link
or even
Spot the Dot
?”

“Well he did pretend to be a gypsy woman, and –”

“I am not and never will be…” Sel suddenly seizes her arm and spins her round to face him. “You’re giggling you naughty girl, and that we cannot have.” He’d just begun to kiss her breasts – he was, she’d learned by now, most definitely a breast man – when Mrs Bogg’s baleful head appears round the door: “Your phone’s going, Mr Wood, ringing like mad it’s been. I thought you wasn’t about”.

“Answer it, dear, will you,” Sel, apparently unmoved by Mrs Bogg’s beady eyed look, lets go of Beatrice, and steps gracefully back to the other side of her desk, “I forgot to switch the phone through.” Beatrice, scarlet faced, hurries next door. Sel turns to Mrs Bogg. “Ah, Mrs Bogg, just the person I’ve been looking for. I’m so sorry about the honey, my wife tells me you were the tiniest bit miffed at old Mr Warren getting our order, but surely you must know after all your help and kindness,” (Mrs Bogg bridles modestly) “the last thing either of us would wish to do is offend you. The thing was we had no idea you kept bees, imagined in our ignorance that old Mr Warren was the only person in the village to do so. If we had known, of course we would have given you and your husband our order. We will of course do so in future, unfortunately…” His voice fades away as Beatrice, shutting the door behind her, picks up the still ringing phone in Sel’s office.

“Selwyn Woodhead’s secretary speaking, can I help you?” There’s a pause at the other end of the line, then: “Er, Sam Mallory speaking.” (So his name’s Sam, is it?) “Are you the lady I met up at the Grove last week? It’s quite ridiculous, but I don’t know your name.”

“Beatrice, Beatrice Travers.”

“Oh.” Another pause. “Do you wish to speak to Mrs Woodhead, I’m afraid she gone to Belchester this morning. Can I be of help?”

“No. I mean yes, that is, perhaps you can give her a message.”

“Certainly.”

“It’s just, well I’ve managed to get that consignment of frogs’ legs in aspic. I told her I’d try to get hold of some for her –”

“Wasn’t that rather difficult?”

“Difficult?”

“To get hold of frogs’ legs in aspic, I mean, in this part of the world.”

“Oh. Oh I see, well not terribly really – are you settling in alright? I, I don’t seem to have seen you around.” Sam wipes the back of his neck with a handkerchief, he’s beginning to feel as though his head’s full of bees.
Tavey
come
back
to
me
–
please
… Oh not again.

“Fine thanks. My first week was pretty hectic and I hardly managed to get further than the garden, but my boss will be out on Wednesday opening the Coltsfoot Carnival, and then I think he has to go to London for a meeting, so I’m hoping things may get a bit slacker. Look, I’ll tell Mrs Woodhead about the frogs’ legs and –”

“Can we meet?”

“Well, I am a bit busy at the moment, but I am hoping to walk to the village this afternoon and have a look at the church; Sel, Mr Woodhead, says it’s got some really interesting things in it. Perhaps I could pop into the shop afterwards, it would be nice to meet your wife…”

“Great. Goodbye then.” Sam replaces the receiver, becomes aware of Karen’s fishy stare.

“That your new girlfriend, then, Major? I reckon you’ll have to get in there quick or her boss’ll have her. They say no one’s safe from him. Doris Bogg says he be a holy terror with the women.”

“If he’s had a go at Doris Bogg he really must be pushed. Anyway, I’m quite sure Miss Travers is perfectly capable of taking care of herself, apart from any other consideration Selwyn Woodhead must be at least fifty.” He shouldn’t be talking this way to Karen, he knows he shouldn’t, somehow can’t stop himself. Returning rapidly to the old military persona, he tells her to get on with checking the stock, and hurries out of the shop before she can reply.

Karen watches him go; the door safely closed behind him, she sticks out her tongue. “I know what you’re up to, my love, so don’t think you can pull the wool over my eyes, you may be a major, but you’re still a man. Men have these urges and don’t I know it!”

Later, their lunch over – Sunday’s lamb cold with salad – Emmie and Sam are in the kitchen, Sam lights a cigarette. “I’ll be out for an hour or two this afternoon, Em, hope that’s OK.”

“It has to be, doesn’t it?” Emmie somehow manages to imbue the plonking of a tea bag in each of their mugs with a sort of resigned resentfulness.

“Oh don’t be like that. You know Monday afternoon’s always quiet, and if you want to go out Karen can take over.”

Emmie pours sugar into her mug, “Every bloody day’s quiet in this place if you ask me.”

“Well, you don’t have to stay if you don’t want to…”

Emmie switches on the washing up machine and, carrying her mug of tea, makes for the door. How she wished she could go. If only Jack… he’d said he’d meet her tomorrow, but would he? “Oh, don’t talk daft, Sam, what would you do without me, I’d like to know? Be off with you.”

Sam’s aware of a spasm of disappointment; this was how it always ended, she’d never leave him, she’d no bloody place to go. “See you later, then, I’ll make sure I’m back before closing…”

In the shop Karen pops a sweet into her mouth, watches him as he stocks up with cigarettes. “Don’t you ever think of giving them things up Major? Fags ain’t good for you, you know.” His mind on other, more important things, he doesn’t answer. Will he see her? He must, surely, she’d have to come past the Grove, there wasn’t another way to the village. He looks at his watch; just after three, plenty of time. Full of hope, he closes the shop door carefully behind him.

*

It’s just after three before Beatrice finally starts out for the village. Lunch didn’t take long, but then Sel asked if she’d mind re-typing his draft speech for the Coltsfoot Carnival opening – too long, he claimed, and one or two of the jokes not entirely suitable. “It’ll never do to upset any more locals, dear, what with that debacle over the honey.”

The typing didn’t take too long, and after a nice, cool shower she feels ready for anything. The food at Brown End might be simple (except when there were visitors) but it certainly seemed to be doing her good: she’d already lost two pounds and no doubt will lose more. The day’s hot but with a gentle, cooling breeze, and as she starts the climb to the Grove, using the footpath just beyond the bridge Josh Bogg had told her about, with the sun on her back, no creepy rooks about, no funny voices, just glorious countryside; she realises with something of a shock, she feels happier than she has for a long time.

At the last field before the wood she stops for a rest; looks back at the valley behind her. The sky, deep blue, is cloudless; where the land flattens out above Brown End a combine harvester, antlike, moves busily up and down a field in clouds of dust; a figure stands on the bridge looking down into the river; but, and this is odd, Brown End itself seems enveloped in mist; sometimes almost invisible, sometimes as clear as everywhere else. Heat haze, perhaps, caused by the house’s proximity to the river, she tells herself firmly, and aware of a slight lowering of mood, resumes her climb.

She’s almost reached the top of the hill, where the footpath joins the road and the poor old Mini gave up the ghost, when she sees him, a brownish figure moving between the trees. He must have seen her too, and raises his arm in salute. They walk towards each other…

What follows is some sort of dream; it had to be. One minute they’re walking towards each other, the next they’re locked in an embrace so savage and passionate as to be quite outside either’s experience; exhilarating and terrifying at the same time.

“
It
’
s
been
so
long
,
so
long
,
Tavey
,
please
…”

“
No
,
not
yet
.
We
must
wait
…”

Somehow, not even sure she wants to, she pulls away from him and they stand facing each other; things slowly returning to some semblance of normality, or as much as anything could under such circumstances. Sam’s the first to speak:

“Oh God I’m sorry, I simply can’t think what came over me.”

“Don’t apologise,” she says with a wisdom and weariness she didn’t know she possessed; despite the warmth of the sun, she feels cold and tired and unhappy. Her instinct is to run away, but she knows quite unequivocally that this – whatever it is – has to be sorted. “Don’t apologise; can’t you see it’s both of us, whatever It is?” Poor Sam, he looks so bewildered, so vulnerable. Odd, she’d never somehow regarded men as being vulnerable before. His hand trembles as he offers her a cigarette. She shakes her head. “I gave up years ago,” she says smiling, “you should too.”

“Do you think we’re being taken over?” he asks. “I mean, why did you call me Brian when we met first? – lots of things.”

“I think it’s possible.”

“What do we do about it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Ever since I came here,” he says, after a silence and not looking at her, “I’ve known there’s something I must do. The trouble is I don’t know what the bloody hell it is.”

“Tell me,” she says, “what’s happened to you, and I’ll tell you what’s happened to me. It’s something to do with this place, obviously, and if we pool our knowledge things might become a bit clearer…” Seated side by side on the grass, they do. When everything’s told, however, things don’t seem much clearer.

“Let’s go over what we do know.” Beatrice lies on her back, on the grass, hands behind her head, trying to sound positive. “There were these lovers, Brian and Tavey, who lived in this area and for reasons unknown their affair or whatever it was, went wrong. That’s about it, I suppose, except that somehow or other we’ve been dragged into it – in your case, from what you say, to put things right. In my case the only feeling I have about Tavey is that she wasn’t very nice.”