Looking for Mrs Dextrose (35 page)

I tried to drive into town but the place was heaving, so we parked just outside. The streets were thronged with families, who seemed to be gathering for an event. They ate
chips from paper cones and children sucked on ice-lollies, though the moon was out. Flags had been tied between all the lampposts lining the promenade and coloured lights added a festive glow to
our route. Out across the sand the waves slurped over shingle and moonshine sprinkled magic dust out at sea.

Dritt-on-Sea was buzzing. That definitely wasn’t how I had remembered it.

As we wandered down the main street into town, I heard a sound that took me right back. ‘Ting-ting!’ – it came from behind me, and when I turned I saw that train I had
remembered from all those years ago. It was a tram. Of course: a train driving through the town. A tram! Not the biggest of trams, more a tourist attraction fit for a couple of dozen passengers,
boxy and blue, with its headlights on. At my feet was track laid into the tarmac.

‘Ting-ting!’ went the tram again. I could have listened to that sound all night, floating among the least troubled memories of childhood, reliving moments when I was carefree and my
socks came up to my knees.

Dad still shuffled rather, and I had to button up his overcoat over that prison garb, lest people mistake him for some sort of criminal.

“Have you recognised anything yet?” I asked.

“Too many minking people,” he grumbled, though I failed to see how that affected his memory.

Tapping the nearest adult male on the shoulder, I said, “Excuse me. Is there some sort of event tonight?” It struck me that, not so long ago, I would never have actively spoken to a
stranger.

“Don’t you know?” he replied. He had a long face, was bald and looked like a vicar. “It’s Moren Day…”

He studied me expectantly, as if I might suddenly exclaim, “Of course! Moren Day!”

When I didn’t, he explained: “The Moren’s a mythical sea creature that eats fishing boats. On Moren Day the Dritters banish it from the waves with flaming torches – not
that there’s been a fishing industry here for 20 years.” He paused. “You’re not a local, then?”

“No,” I said.

He smiled. “The torchlight parade starts at eight. Don’t miss it,” he said. “You won’t be allowed a torch if you’re not from Dritt, though.”

We followed the flow of human traffic heading into the centre of town. While enjoying the atmosphere, I was also aware that we had nowhere to sleep and time was marching
alongside us. Dad was proving no help at all.

Then a brainwave hit me. Why take Mohammed to the mountain? If Dad were unlikely to recognise anyone, perhaps someone else might recognise him? And where better to enquire than in a place that
sold alcohol? He must have been once known in every hostelry in town.

There was the obvious and major snag: dare I take him into a pub? Then again, dare I try to leave him outside?

We passed into a narrow street, inadequate for the number of revellers, shoulders everywhere and a back-pack in the face. I had to keep checking behind me, that Dad hadn’t been dragged
backwards amid the sea of people, and downwards to ensure I didn’t tread on a small child. Claustrophobia began setting in. When I spotted diamond-shaped lead lights to my left, a mass of
bodies behind the glass, knowing it must be a pub I made a snap decision.

Grabbing Dad’s collar, I pulled him inside. If the scent of hops hit me, it must have assaulted him.

His eyes grew very wide and he was gritting his teeth. His face had gone white, even the scar tissue.

“Are you alright?”

“No,” he managed.

I reached for his hand, which was shaking. He pulled it away.

“I’m going to ask at the bar, see if anyone knows you. You can wait outside if you want.”

He stiffened. “I minking will not!” He began parting drinkers on his way to the bar, like Moses through the crimson-nosed.

Clutching on to his coattails I was dragged along with him. The three bar staff, all wearing ‘Moren Day’ T-shirts featuring a sea-serpent drawn by a small child, were working on the
edge of panic. Nearest to us was a woman furiously chewing gum, in her early-twenties with straight blonde hair pulled so tightly back she looked like she’d had a facelift.

I got in before Dad could order, pointing at him: “Excuse me! Do you know who this is?”

She surveyed me oddly. “Why don’t you ask him yourself?”

I hadn’t phrased it right. “No, no, I know who he is…”

“You’re weird,” she said, and turned her attention to Dad. “Yes?”

Time stopped. It was as if I were observing the bar from up among the old rafters, and everyone had turned to stare, anticipating his response.

He took a breath. “Ah, what the mink,” he blurted, on the exhale. “I’ll have a minking… what d’yer call it? Cooler?”

Cola? Cola!
He wanted a minking cola!
As I slapped his back, embarrassingly happy, a voice came: “Harry? Harry Dextrose?”

A porky chap in his sixties, belly bursting from an old-bloke shirt, slacks and comb-over, was standing in a doorway behind the bar. Sweat ran in rivulets off his forehead and his cheeks
resembled a well-spanked arse.

Judging from Dad’s expression, he was none the wiser.

“It is!” exclaimed the porky chap. “Harry Dextrose! I’ll be damned! We thought you’d left us for good. Where you been?” It dawned on him that Harry had no
idea who he was. “Robin Botham, landlord – remember?”

That did it. “Well mink me! Lord Rubby-Bottom! How is yer?”

Lord Rubby-Bottom lowered his voice. “Yeah, listen, keep it down, Harry. That’s not for the customers, eh?” Then he added: “Here, I know someone who’ll be keen to
see you!”

Dad shrugged.

“Mrs Dextrose!”

I was stunned. “Mrs Dextrose?” The nape of my neck tingled. “You mean she’s here?”

The landlord waved a thumb at me. “Who’s this, Harry?”

But Harry didn’t speak.

“I’m his son,” I explained hurriedly. “Mrs Dextrose – is she here?”

“Yeah. But. You’re his
son
?”

Dad remained frozen in time, saggy-gobbed.

“Where is she now?”

“Might be upstairs.”

“Upstairs? In this pub?”

“Didn’t he tell you?” said the landlord. “They couldn’t afford the rent on the old place so I let them use our spare room.”

“How long ago was that?”

He shrugged. “Three years? Maybe a bit less?”

Hang on. “So you’re saying that Mrs Dextrose didn’t travel with him, on his last ‘expedition’?” I couldn’t help the quote marks.

“Like I said, they moved in upstairs, then he left soon after without a word to anyone. She was hopping mad! We started to wonder whether he’d died, but she wasn’t having any
of it. You are in for an earful when she gets hold of you, Harry!”

I pushed Dad with the palm of my hand. “You bloody old fool. You never lost her! She never even went with you!” I was laughing despite myself.

He winced.

“So she’s here now?” I asked the landlord.

“Hang on, I’ll call up…”

He went out back and I heard: “Mrs Dex-
trose
? Mrs Dex
trose
?”

I could barely contain my excitement and trepidation. I was to be reunited with my mother!

Robin Botham reappeared. “Not there,” he said. “Must be out at the parade.”

Dad and I exchanged glances.

“You lads care for a quick one, then?” said the landlord. “On the house!”

We didn’t look back. Not even Dad.

The melee in the lane outside the pub had calmed down. As I sought my bearings I noticed for the first time the sign hanging up on the wall: The Dog and Duck, featuring a
painting of a brown-and-white hunting dog and a duck, craning its neck. Something clicked in my mind’s eye.

That wasn’t a cow and the moon – it was a dog and a zero. The cricket version of zero: a duck. The Dog and Duck!

So the demon juice had worked after all. Somewhere, way at the back of Dextrose’s mind, among the stacks of detritus, the empty bottles and the used prophylactics, he’d been aware of
his wife’s situation all along. If only his drawing skills had been better, we might have made the connections.

But this was no time for recriminations. They could come later, at the reunion.

Grabbing Dad’s hand, I pulled him along with me in the direction the crowd had been heading, trying to force some impetus into his frustrating gait.

We emerged shortly into a square, humming with massed, expectant voices and lit up on all sides by the orange caress of flickering flames. The torchlight parade was starting. A clock struck
eight.

How the hell were we going to spot one particular old lady among this mess of people?

“Dad, what does Mum look like?” It seemed an odd question to be asking.

“Long silver hair,” he offered. “And a woman’s face.”

Heart racing, I scanned the crowd seeking out women of a certain age. It was all I had. Mostly there were families with children in tow, whom I could discount, though there
were sufficient oldies milling about to make the task a nightmare.

The flaming torches comprised long, pus-coloured wax candles, held in a cardboard tube with a circular hand-guard, so they looked like toy swords. Indeed, some of the children were using them as
such, play-fighting with siblings and friends, while parents tried to wrestle the weapons off them, citing health-and-safety. I could sense the St John’s Ambulance folk licking their
lips.

In the back of my mind was the knowledge that, if we did fail, we could track Mrs Dextrose to the pub later. But I wanted to find her now. I had to. Already I could imagine the warmth and
amazement of a reunion among those tiny real fires.

As we turned a corner of the square the crowd was funnelling down one particular street, presumably heading for the sea to confront the Moren.

“Anything?” I asked Dad.

He shook his head.

“What about her?” I asked, pointing towards a nearby bent old lady wearing a bobble-hat, whose face resembled a sultana.

“Minking cheek!” he shot back.

We followed the flow out of the square, shuffling along the edge of the parade, as the river of contented souls in rainwear and thick jumpers, revelling in the community vibe, made its way
towards the ocean. I was too tense to share their enjoyment.

As we crossed one junction Dad suddenly gripped my arm.

“Mink!” he hissed through clenched teeth.

I followed his gaze, my pupils flitting over the scene, taking snapshots then moving on, until they alighted upon the likeliest candidate.

She was wearing a blue, rubbery-looking mackintosh, and a bright-yellow waterproof hat, such as trawlermen wore. Hanging down over the back of the mac was a ponytail of silvery-blonde hair. She
was shorter than the average promenader, and I had only glimpsed her briefly when the people around her shifted positions.

“Blue mac, yellow hat?” I asked.

“Think so. Me eyes…”

When I looked back among the crowd, she had disappeared. I scanned for the yellow hat, but it had become submerged among the flesh and clothing.

On impulse I threw myself into the throng, leaving Dad behind, and spent several minutes pleading, “Excuse me! Excuse me!” pushing people aside and spinning frantically, searching
for that hat. Hemmed in and pestered along I became disorientated and lost any sense of where I was in relation to where the woman in the sou’wester had been.

One man, old enough to know better, actively pushed against me to block my route, as if getting to the front of the parade might be some badge of honour.

“I’m looking for my mother!” I told him.

“Aren’t we all,” he snapped back.

Frustrated, I headed once again for the sidelines, where I found Dad looking distressed. “Where’d yer go?” he demanded.

“Where do you think I went?”

I pulled him along until we neared a junction where the parade had stopped, giving me a chance to rediscover my bearings. As I once again flitted my gaze over the sea of heads, there, at the
front of the queue, I spotted the yellow hat.

Its owner was no more than ten yards away, but with a sardine-packed scrum of people between us.

I shook my Dad’s arm, pointing. “Look, there she is! There she is! Call to her!”

He did not. Guilt and fear had visibly gripped his troubled mind and though his mouth opened and shut it made no sound. He shook his head.

So it was down to me. I wondered whether it would always be thus.

“Mrs Dextrose! Mrs Dextrose!” I called out, waving my arms.

The people nearest me turned to stare; the woman in the yellow hat did not. The background burble must have drowned out my calls.

I tried again, louder.

“MRS DEXTROSE! MRS DEXTROSE!”

No reaction from her, though people further into the crowd glanced at me curiously. It crossed my mind that the woman in the yellow hat might not even be Mrs Dextrose.

“
MRS DEXTROSE!
”

The yellow hat turned. It turned towards me and I saw its owner’s face for the first time. Keen-eyed and small, fresh complexion, little or no make-up. Vibrant-looking. The sort of face
that enjoys watching trees in a storm.