Blowing It (19 page)

‘Sorry,’ Gaz said. He looked as if he’d wished he’d brought his own car so he could simply get up, pick up his jacket and leave right this minute.

‘Gaz, it’s not that. It’s not that
at all
.’ As he spoke, Ilex caught a glimpse of Manda sneaking a smile at Gaz. Did she agree? Is that what they all sounded like?

‘We’re not a bunch of grasping bastards.’ Ilex almost spat the words. ‘We don’t need to be, do we? Look around you here, Gaz. Sean and Clover are doing fine on their own, don’t you think?’

Clover blinked. They
had
been doing fine. Sean was going to be home, he’d said, for three days next week. It wasn’t leave – just, well, not quite enough to do at work. Having him home was better than having to think about what he was up to when she hadn’t leaped on that plane to Manchester, but in the long run it could be financial disaster.

‘And I’m an independent grown-up who hasn’t needed hand-outs from home for a lot of years now.’ Even to his own ears, he sounded as if he protested too much.

‘Sorry,’ Gaz muttered again. Sorrel squeezed his hand, not entirely sure he was all that far out.

‘So all you really need is an event – something distracting.’ Gaz brightened. ‘Why don’t you have a massive great party at the house for them? Tell them it was going to be a surprise, like when’re their birthdays? What about that?’

Brains ticked over. Sean swigged wine noisily and Clover looked round the table at them all, certain now she’d completely wasted her time, for she was obviously on her own with this. Neither Ilex nor Sorrel were actually that outraged that Holbrook House was to be sold. So long as Mac and Lottie got it all together in a way that suited them, it had turned into something more or less inevitable. Was
it
that easy to say goodbye to all those years there? Had they no souls at all?

‘There’s Sorrel’s eighteenth in July,’ Ilex suggested.

‘No
way
.’ Sorrel rejected that one immediately. ‘I really,
really
don’t want a poncy party at home. Me and my mates, we’ve made plans. We’re just going to hang at a festival and see bands. No party. Definitely no party.’ No way was she having those wasters from school crashing in – and Carly would make a point of it – just so they could sneer at the raggy curtains and the tiles missing in the bathrooms, and the weird black walls in the sitting room. They were so stupid, they’d probably draw on the walls or scratch filthy words on the panelling in the hallway. Not a chance.

Clover sighed. ‘Well, I don’t know what else to suggest. That’s it then.’

‘What do you mean, “that’s it”?’ Sorrel snapped. ‘Don’t even think of making it all my fault!’

‘No wait, you need something bigger than that,’ Gaz said. ‘Something they’ll need to make lots of plans for, like, I dunno, does the village have a carnival or fête or …?’

They all considered for a moment. ‘It’s not really a fête type of village, actually. Mostly commuters and that, now,’ Sorrel said. ‘Or at least …’ she giggled, ‘Mum and Dad aren’t really fête type of people!’

Ilex laughed. ‘No, you’re right there. Can you imagine Mum in a big flowery hat, drawing the
raffle
and running the tombola? “Another spliff, Vicar?”’

‘She would if it was for a charity. OK, not the hat.’ Clover grinned.

‘What you really need is a wedding.’ Gaz was only just heard over the laughter. ‘My sister’s took months to organize.’

‘It’s gone very quiet,’ Sean commented, a good minute later. ‘Anyone got any more suggestions?’

‘Um … right,’ Clover said. ‘Coffee anyone?’

TWELVE

TEN O’CLOCK IN
the morning and the sun blazed beyond the curtains. Mac stared at the crackled ochre paint of the ceiling and considered the possibility of Zanzibar. If he was there, right now, in the Peace of Love wing of the Emerson and Green Hotel, Stone Town, he’d be gazing up at a gauzy mosquito net, edged with gold-threaded blue silk. Later, he and Lottie would have breakfast up a flight of steps in a private, open-sided terracotta tower, looking out across the narrow alleyways of the city to the harbour and the sea. July might be better than now, he thought – unless it was just too unbearably hot, then they could take in the Zanzibar Film Festival, which seemed to be as much about art and music as movies. Perhaps that would be a good place to start their travels, and they could go for some lion-watching in Tanzania as well.

Mac rubbed at a nagging ache in his left leg then pushed the duvet back and considered beginning
the
day. It crossed his mind that if at some future time he was ever institutionalized (and where would that be? Not prison, as he’d been fully legal since he’d quit smoking dope on the day George keeled over, dead from cocaine-induced heart failure. Old folks’ home? That was more of an option – so long as involuntary euthanasia for the financially feckless hadn’t by then become law), there would be someone else dictating his rising times and he would be forced to give up his habitual late-night/late-morning rock ’n’ roll hours. This, he felt, would be a shame, for it suited him to go to bed after the rest of the civilized working world. He saw it as part of the privilege of
not
having a nine-to-five career, a non-job perk. In summer he loved the post-midnight silence out there in the garden’s silky darkness, especially the rich grey/blue of a mid-June night sky that never quite went blacker than the richest inky dusk. Even since last November, since there was no longer a wolfhound to usher out for a late-night pee, he always went out in all weathers for a breather before bed and was sure in the still solitude he could feel the earth turning beneath him, that he was at one with the little night creatures that scurried and fed and bred only feet away in the walls and hedges. In winter he loved slobbing out on the tatty purple Knoll sofa with the lunatic-hour trash TV programmes – old films, bizarre reality shows, news from unknown bits of the world. And it very much pleased him that at
closing
time on quiz nights at the Feathers, when the scores had been totted up, winners announced and Mike the landlord was roaming around collecting glasses and reminding people that they had homes to go to, he felt wide awake and just getting under way. Plenty of energy he had then, more than enough to go back to Al’s place, drink some of Al’s Scotch and strum half-remembered tunes on Al’s guitar (with Al on piano) till Mrs Al came downstairs and complained that some people had work in the morning, even if they didn’t. Of course the difference between him and the younger, fitter Al was obvious. Al, come morning, would be up and out early to one of his three garden/handyman jobs, regardless of sleep hours. Mondays, Wednesdays and the sunnier Fridays, by eight he’d be leaning against Lottie’s chicken house having his third cigarette of the day and waiting till Charlie the cockerel had wandered down the orchard before venturing into the hen-run to collect any eggs. What would happen to Al when they sold the place? Mac’s conscience prodded him uncomfortably about the fact that they hadn’t properly talked about it yet. Mrs Howard would be all right: top-rate cleaners were snapped up by an eager queue of neighbours. There’d been many an attempt to poach her in the past. Susie with the gallery had apparently already put in a bid, now she knew they were selling. The Al question was something he and Lottie would obviously need to talk about, and
soon
. Mac had mentioned the travel plan to him, but somehow the moment where he then said, ‘Oh yes, and by the way, once we’ve flogged the house, you’ll be out of one of your cushy, cash-in-hand numbers,’ hadn’t come up. Perhaps the new people would take Al on, though they’d probably want him to up his hours. Even a total horticultural novice who couldn’t tell a rose from a stick of rhubarb could see that Al wasn’t entirely keeping on top of the job. Maybe he could make it a condition of the sale that the premises came complete with staff. It would certainly save the incomers the hassle of looking for a gardener and unless they already had their own horticulture company or something or were planning to accommodate students from nearby Wisley, they’d certainly need one.

Mac sat up in bed, swung his legs to the floor and stood up quickly. Too quickly, as it turned out, for the room swam and shimmered. He dropped back safely on to the bed, feeling shaky and breathless and slightly nauseous. He shouldn’t do that, he realized. He should take things more slowly – his blood pressure must be low, or was it high? Whichever one it was that made you fall over if you stood up too fast, it seemed he had it.

Something told him that one of these options was better than the other but as it was a few years since he’d had a medical overhaul (partly in case the results sent his health insurance premiums rocketing), he’d lost track of his body’s internal vital
statistics
. The ones on the outside, and here he fondled the spare, squashy flesh of his stomach, were quite enough to take notice of, thank you.

All the same, Mac felt himself notching up another hint of mortality on life’s (or, dear God, was it death’s?) checklist. First the bus pass thing, now this. Whatever this was, it felt like a spiteful little nudge from the Reaper, a reminder that Mac had been added to the old soul-snatcher’s To Do list and he’d be dealt with in due course. He hoped, right now, as he massaged his achy leg, that it wouldn’t be before he’d had that breakfast in Zanzibar.

What was Ilex doing in a police car? Clover was sure it was him. She had just come out of Steinberg and Tolkien on the King’s Road, having spent a small fortune on a fabulous vintage, pink and orange chiffon Zandra Rhodes dress that would be such a perfect present for Sorrel’s eighteenth birthday in July. The police car, heading west at no great speed, had slowed so that a woman, one of those ancient Chelsea eccentrics in balding mink, lime-green tights and a lavishly veiled hat, could cross the road and Clover had caught sight of Ilex through the car’s open window as he turned to look in her direction, then had speedily turned back again, his head obscured by his upraised hand. She didn’t see the driver as the car suddenly sped away, turned off past Heal’s and disappeared out of range, but she pictured for herself a chunky, pleased-with-himself
cop
, school of
The Bill
. Ilex couldn’t have been arrested, she felt sure, as she walked back in the direction of the Bluebird where she was to meet Mary-Jane for lunch, or he’d have been sitting in the back seat and the windows wouldn’t have been open.

Outside Designers Guild, Clover stopped for a quick look at a luscious purple and lime devoré velvet sofa, then delved into her bag for her phone. She searched for Ilex’s mobile number and called it. It must have been him in that car, she concluded as she was put straight through to voice-mail; it must have been him, he must have seen her and had deliberately switched the phone off. What was he up to? She hadn’t heard from him since the night of her dinner. Manda, ever politely proper, had sent a sweet card (featuring line-drawings of classic handbags), thanking her and Sean and telling them that she and Ilex had had a lovely evening. Nothing else – so presumably Gaz’s suggestion of a wedding party at Holbrook House hadn’t had a fruitful follow-up. Sometimes, Clover thought exasperatedly, Ilex really wasn’t the sharpest pencil in the box.

Mary-Jane was waiting at a sunny table in the Bluebird’s courtyard. She wore over-sized sunglasses and was studying a copy of the
A to Z
.

‘Hi, sweetie! Isn’t this a treat?’ She greeted Clover with a hug. ‘I got here early and I’ve been sitting here doing my homework for the tennis job while I waited for you. Go on, you tell me the quickest route
from
Wimbledon to Buckingham Palace and I’ll see if you’d be up to the job.’

‘The Palace? Heavens, they are putting the tennis players up in style!’ Clover laughed as she draped her jacket over the back of the seat. The day had really warmed up now. She briefly thought of the old lady she’d just seen crossing the road in full-scale mink. Did she wear it whatever the weather? Did it represent the best times she’d had? She felt suddenly sad; were old, treasured, clothes all that was left when you recognized that all the best times were over?

‘The players stay all over the city!’ Mary-Jane said. ‘Go on then, tell me, best route.’ She closed the book.

‘Well that’s easy: Somerset Road, turn right along the Common, Tibbet’s corner, down Putney Hill, over the bridge—’

‘Completely wrong. And it seems we’re not allowed to use the bridge.’

‘Ah. How odd. Why’s that? OK then, Wandsworth Bridge? Battersea?’

She didn’t care, actually, if the tennis stars each took a private helicopter or jet-skied up the Thames: she was still wondering about Ilex and the police car. She half-listened while Mary-Jane gave her a road-by-road account that surely, by Clover’s muddled reckoning, would result in a highly nervous potential men’s finalist wondering why his chauffeuse had parked outside Battersea Dogs’
Home
and was now holding a map upside down on the steering wheel.

When Mary-Jane paused for breath, Clover asked, ‘Mary-Jane, could I just borrow your mobile for a sec please?’

‘Sure, of course you can!’ Mary-Jane gave her a swift questioning look as she handed over the phone, then pushed back her chair. ‘Tell you what – I’ll just go up the stairs for a quick wazz and leave you to it. I’ll order a couple of glasses of wine on the way back. Pinot G. OK for you?’

‘Oh yes, lovely, thanks,’ Clover murmured, dialling Ilex’s number. He answered on the second ring, sounding nervous and a bit breathless.

‘Hey, brother, how are you? You sound as if you’ve been running.’ Or could it be … no, what a horrible thought. You didn’t want to picture your own brother having sex with anyone at all, particularly not someone in a cop car. Apart from awful imaginings of flesh and discarded polyester clothing, there might be guns. Or an Alsatian.

‘Oh! Clover, it’s you! I didn’t recognize the number. Where are you?’ He sounded relieved. And where was
he
? Was he in a cell, waiting for a pair of detectives to give him the nice and nasty treatment?