An Affair to Remember (11 page)

“Unlike her alter ego,” Sam says, trying and failing to take her hand, “and it wasn’t just Brian and Tavey being in love, it’s me too. With you, I mean. I’ve wanted to kiss you ever since we met.” Beatrice’s reaction is not, however, what he had hoped.

She gets up angrily, brushing leaves from her skirt. “It may have escaped your memory, Major Mallory, but you have a wife, and if that’s all you can contribute, I’m going.”

“Please don’t,” he calls after her, realising too late what a fool he has been, “I didn’t mean to upset you; it was a totally idiotic thing to say under the circumstances. Look, we must talk, it’s important, really important, before anything else happens.” But, ignoring the desperation in his voice, she’s already climbed the style into the road, and disappeared from sight.

Jack Fulton in his green Volvo breasts the hill from the village and starts down the other side. He’s on his way to visit Mr Carter yet again. The old sod couldn’t make up his mind, sales were on the low side this month, so he had to try and persuade him. Bloody nuisance he was, always had been, he didn’t know why they bothered. All of a sudden he slams on his brakes. Was that a bird ahead? It was. Not only that, a bird he hadn’t seen around before, tall and fair and marching down the middle of the road like a sergeant major on patrol. The previously sulky expression on Jack’s face changes to that of his customary bonhomie. He pulls the Volvo gently alongside the marching figure.

“Going far, love, can I give you a lift?” Beatrice looks at him, her usually good natured face contorted with fury.

“Piss off, will you, you stupid old bastard!”

Chapter 7

Beatrice, in her newly repaired Mini – delivered by the man from the garage while she was up at the Grove with Sam – sits fuming in a road-works queue outside the town of Belchester. Early evening sun beats down on the Mini’s roof; a man in a Fiesta in the adjacent traffic lane picks his nose – until he becomes aware she’s looking at him and runs his fingers through his hair instead – and she feels hot, angry and miserable. Sneezing, no doubt from the petrol fumes, not to mention dust, she realises she hasn’t got a handkerchief, wipes her nose with her hand, and at last the queue begins to move.

There’s no doubt about it; she must be going mad, why else was she doing what she was doing? It was just that on her return from the baffling scene at the Grove, there was the Mini waiting for her in the yard, and to climb into it and drive away seemed at the time the obvious thing to do. Where, didn’t matter; she just wanted to get away from that haunted valley and Sam with his sad, longing eyes; above all from herself. How could she have been so cruel and unpleasant to Sam and so rude to the dreadful man in the green Volvo? The Volvo man had, after all, offered her a lift. And it certainly wasn’t his fault that she and Sam seemed to be the victims of some cruel joke. She puts her foot on the clutch, third gear at last, and they’re approaching a roundabout, she’ll be able to turn back and make for home. A few minutes later the Mini is the only car left on the road; she even manages to coax it into a wheezy sixty mph, and what with the breeze through the open sunroof ruffling her hair and the countryside flashing past, she begins to feel marginally better.

She’d been right when she told Sam it was no good trying to run away from what was happening to them; like it or not they had to see it through together. Having said that, why at the first sign of trouble did she have to turn tail and run? Sam had told her he was in love with her – what on earth was wrong with that? She liked him, really liked him, and it was not as if in her thirty-two years she’d been inundated with men declaring their love for her, was it? She should have been flattered and instead had behaved like some demented harpy. That being said, and OK, she was ashamed of her behaviour, there still remained the question of what was happening to her and Sam, and why?

‘
Those
who
offend
the
Gods
must
pay
.’

Oh no! A convenient layby’s coming up, with shaking hands she turns the Mini into it. Offend the bloody Gods – oh, please… What had she done to offend them, what Gods, anyway? Tavey, Sam had said, but it wasn’t just Tavey, was it, it was something else, something grander. Taking a deep breath, she closes her eyes, tries to relax. This has no effect, so she opens them again and becomes aware she’s being scrutinised by yet another rook. This time he’s perched uncomfortably on a swaying twig and looks as if he might fall off it at any moment; she hopes he does. Could he be the one from Brown End? No, of course he couldn’t, all rooks look alike anyway. In an effort to calm things down, she switches on the car radio.

“Radio Belchester (as if you didn’t know!), your wall to wall radio programme, giving you an update on the week’s events, so get your diaries out, there’s thrilling times ahead!” Tommy Lockerby – didn’t Radio Belchester have anyone else? Still, despite being such a pain, his singsong DJ voice did have a soothing effect. “…First on the list is the opening of the Coltsfoot Carnival by superstar Selwyn Woodhead. Sel Woodhead, would you believe, has come to live in our midst. How’s that for a date for your diaries…” The rook, who appears to be listening, flies away in disgust and Beatrice giggles. She’s not going to be intimidated by a rook or anyone else for that matter, she tells herself, as switching off the radio and turning on the ignition, she re-starts the car and heads for home. If she gets her skates on she’ll be in time for one (preferably two) of Sel’s pre-dinner specials, and if ever there was a moment when she needed one, that moment was now.

*

“Jack, you promised,” Emmie wails into the phone. She’s in the callbox down by the bridge and is beginning to feel a bit frantic. Claustro-what’s-it, and a small boy’s just peered at her through the glass and made a face.

“But pet,” Jack’s voice is a throaty murmur; lately he’s taken to modelling his telephone voice on the man in the Lager ad who sounds like Orson Welles, and very effective he’s found it to be. Wasted on poor old Em though. “If I could, I would, you know that.” Emmie bursts into tears.

Sam’s in the bar of The Donkey trying to make himself drunk. What else was there to do? “Phone out of order, is it, Major?” Josh Bogg at his elbow, looking inquisitive.

“Not that I know of, why?”

Josh takes a sip of his beer, being a punter of long standing he has his own special mug to drink out of. “Saw your missus down in the phone box a while back, thought you must be having trouble with it, that’s all.” In point of fact Josh knows perfectly well Mrs M. was phoning that fancy man of hers, but was interested to see the Major’s reaction to the news. To his disappointment the Major appears to take it in his stride:

“She probably wanted to make a private call, sometimes it’s difficult when the shop’s full of people, and we still haven’t managed to get another extension downstairs.” Was there no privacy in this place? If he wants to get drunk, it looks as if he’ll have to do so at home. He gets up from his seat at the bar, gulps down his drink. “Sorry I can’t stay for a chat, Josh, but I’ve a load of work to get through before supper.”

“Night then, Major, mind how you go.”

Emerging from the pub Sam feels a little dizzy, perhaps he was a bit drunk after all. He’d take a short walk before returning home, and try to think things over. As usual he ends up down at the bridge, the river seems to hold a sort of fascination for him. Lighting a cigarette, his mind, as it has a hundred times already since this afternoon, returns to the scene at the Grove. There must be something he has to do before Brian and Tavey can somehow be at peace and go back to wherever it is they came from, that much is clear, but what? Plainly him falling in love with Tavey/Beatrice was not part of the plan, but he couldn’t help himself. For the first time in his life he was in love, and he had a pretty strong feeling it was for keeps; there it was. From her behaviour this afternoon it was pretty clear Beatrice was not in love with him, even found him repulsive, the look of anger and revulsion on her face when she left him that afternoon made that all too clear.

Overwhelmed with sadness and longing, he leans against the parapet looking down into the river, wondering what on earth he can do. Watches as a dark raft of weeds floating on the surface of the water is carried swiftly along by the current, disappears under the arch of the bridge; and suddenly there’s this elderly lady standing beside him. She places a skinny hand on his wrist:

“
You
could
try
the
Guardians
.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t quite catch –” But the lady has turned away and disappears into the shadows.

*

“Jack, you’re hurting: get off…”

“OK, sweetheart, OK, anything to oblige a lady.”

Jack Fulton and Clarrie Woodhead are once again in the back of Jack’s Volvo, Clarrie’s head resting uncomfortably on a box of samples. There must be better ways than this. She sits up, heaving Jack unceremoniously off her and causing him to hit his head on the car roof. “Mind how you go, darling, there’s a good girl.”

“Get a move on, Jack, I’ve got cramp. Why on earth we couldn’t have gone to the Grove I don’t know, there’s no one about there at this time of the evening.”

“Thought you’d like a change, darling, that’s all.” This wasn’t actually the case: the fact was he has a feeling his somewhat hectic love life could be catching up with him and if he doesn’t watch it things could, as from time to time they had an unfortunate habit of doing, get out of hand. The penalty, he supposes, of having fun. Lucky his holidays are coming up; a fortnight with the wife on the Costa del Sol would be a rest cure after this. The trouble was, he’s thinking as he clambers stiffly out of the car, and wanders across the road to pee stylishly into the hedge, all women turned out to be the same once you’d screwed them a few times, even classy birds like Clarrie.

Clarrie watches him, trying not to feel disgust. What in God’s name did she see in him, she wonders helplessly. Jack returns to the car, “I don’t know about you, pet, but I’m badly in need of a noggin, it’s been a long day.”

“Jack, your zip…”

Minutes later they’re seated in the Pink Panther bar at The Trojan Horse, a large 1930s public house much patronised by coach parties, up on the main road. Clarrie looks at the décor and shudders. “Just a quick G and T, I can’t stay long.”

“Anything you say, pet, anything you say.” He looks about him approvingly, “Classy little joint, don’t you think?” Clarrie closes her eyes. Jack perseveres. “I think I met your hubby’s new sec this afternoon.”

“Oh?”

“Tall, fair, kind of cool looking.”

“She’s certainly tall and fair, I don’t know about cool.”

“Didn’t you say you thought she had a screw loose?”

“I didn’t say she had a screw loose. I merely said she seemed a bit odd, all that stuff about the rookery –”

“If you ask me, she’s off her trolley – suffers from that para… para-what’s-it.”

“Paranoia. That’s not very likely, Sel says she’s a brilliant secretary and anyway –”

“All I can say is you should have seen her this afternoon.”

“Gave you the brush-off, did she?”

That was the trouble with bright birds, they cottoned on to things too quickly. “Didn’t give her the chance. Anyway, you mustn’t say things like that, you know old Jack only has eyes for you.”

“What did happen then?”

“Well,” Jack takes a gulp of his whisky, “I’m on my way to pay yet another visit on old Carter, the stupid old devil won’t make up his mind about his order, when I see this bird ahead of me walking down the middle of the road just past the Grove. Well you know old Jack, always ready to help a damsel in distress –”

“I know old Jack alright.”

“Don’t be like that, pet, it’s not nice, really it isn’t…”

“Oh get on with it, I’ve got to go in a minute.”

“Well I stop the car and offer her a lift.”

“And –?”

“You’d think I’d threatened to kill her! She’s shaking all over and tells me to piss off.”

Clarrie giggles. “That wasn’t very nice, was it?”

“No, it wasn’t very nice. She said some other things too, but I’m not going to repeat them, I hate to hear a woman use bad language, always have, and anyway I was only trying to help.”

“Her mother probably told her not to talk to strangers.”

“She did talk to strangers, she told me to piss off.” But Clarrie’s had enough, finishes her drink in one gulp and stands up.

“Let’s go,” she says briskly and makes for the door.

*

Beatrice lies on her back in bed staring up at the ceiling, unable to sleep. It’s silly really, earlier in the evening she’d felt so sleepy she could hardly keep her eyes open. Something whines over her head in the dark. Must be a mosquito, there would be mosquitos, being so near the river, and she’ll never get to sleep with that around. She sits up, switches on the light, nearly three, and she has to be up by seven. Sel wanted a pre-breakfast session, and lovely though he is, he dislikes one being late. Perhaps she should go down and make herself a drink, people said that helped, and surely Juan wouldn’t mind.

Spotless, the kitchen hums gently round her, everything in its place. The trouble is everything is concealed by oak doors and she can’t find the fridge. She tries a cupboard that looks as if it might possibly conceal one, but it turns out to contain a wine rack which swings out and hits her in the chest. Feeling helpless, she tries another, equally unsuccessfully. This is actually the first time she’s been in the kitchen, Juan doesn’t encourage visitors. It’s his domain, Clarrie had told her that first day, and on no account must Juan be upset. Just about to give up, go back upstairs and get a glass of water from her own bathroom, which she should have done in the first place, she sees it, a gleaming monster in an alcove at the far end of the kitchen. From the vast array on offer she selects a small bottle of orange juice, and sipping from the bottle, there being no visible sign of cups or glasses, carries it over to the large, uncurtained kitchen window and looks out. The window faces on to the yard at the back of the house, tonight illuminated by the light of a huge, yellow harvest moon. Opposite, the great barn looms, slit windows staring blindly back at the house; behind the barn the trees that hold the rookery sigh gently in the night wind. It all looks quite magical, and Beatrice, compelled by something she doesn’t even bother to understand, bottle in hand, wanders into the passage that leads to the back door, with some difficulty unbolts the door, and walks out into the moonlit yard.