But the winning votes in the popularity poll by a fair margin go to the king penguins. There are about a dozen of them wandering about their enclosure with their flippers hanging away from their bodies, like multiple George W. Bushes walking out of the White House for a press conference. I suppose it's their humanoid characteristics that draw the crowds – that and the fact that king penguins manage to be comical without feeling the need to invade Iraq. One end of their enclosure appears to be in use as a rubbish dump. There are two battered pub parasols and a heap of rusty metal there. I point this out to Maggie who says she thinks it may be a sculpture. Perhaps this is what the penguins do for therapy. Much of the enclosure is built high up which makes it difficult for the children to get a good view, so one mum helps her little girl clamber up the rocks next to the glass-sided pool so she can balance over an IT CAN BE DANGEROUS TO CLIMB ON THESE ROCKS notice. Admittedly the wording is hedging its bets with that 'can be'.
Back outside Animal World, we decide to go to another of Packingham's famous attractions, the Miniature Village. Both Maggie and I have vague memories of coming to see this as children. There are no signs to send us off in the right direction, and there doesn't seem much point in asking any of the German or Welsh ice-cream-eating buggy-pushers. But, as we pass the toilet block with an entry like a London underground station, we do spot a chap getting out of his car by the bottle bank to unload a clinking box from his boot.
I trot over and ask, 'Excuse me. Could you tell us the way to the Miniature Village please.'
'Hmm,' he replies. 'Well, I don't think it's that direction.' He points across the Animal World car park. 'I've lived here two and a half years, I should know.' I give him an encouraging smile. 'I can tell you where the village museum is. Or the model railway exhibition?' I switch to a slight headshake with intake of breath. 'You don't want the village museum. You want the Miniature Village.' I grunt, smile and nod. 'I get a feeling,' he says with deliberation, 'that it's that way.' He points across the road and down a bit.
'OK thanks,' I say. 'Do you mind if I ask you something?' It's his turn to nod, obviously keen to atone for his ignorance. 'Is it a nice place to live, Packingham?' Maggie's just arrived in time to hear this. She groans and backs away.
'Yes. We love south-west England,' he answers. 'It's not like this every day in Packingham, you know. All these crowds. It's only when the weather's nice. Well, I suppose if I'm honest, it's busy most of the summer. And on nice days in spring and autumn as well.'
'Is that a pain?'
'Not really. We live over there.' He gestures over his shoulder. 'On the edge of the village. It's like anywhere else there. We've got a little bungalow.' He's warming to his theme. 'The wife likes it. She's got a nice summer job in one of the gift shops. Keeps her busy, and the extra cash is always handy, eh?'
I thank him, and we head back in the direction we've come from, stumble on another coloured map that we'd walked straight past, and a minute later we're paying seven pounds for two to get into the Miniature Village.
'Have you been busy?' I ask the woman in the ticket booth.
'Very. As usual,' she answers in a cut-glass accent that sounds more used to addressing the WI than answering questions from the hoi polloi.
'Is it mainly families?'
'Yes, and older people who came here as children. And that can mean some very old people,' she adds with a note of pride, 'since the model first opened in 1935.'
'Wow,' I say believing that to be the dutiful response.
It is, there's no doubt, a wonder of patience and skill. All those little pieces of stone, bonsai maple trees and dolls house lace curtains beneath perfectly tiled cottage roofs, one of which brushes my bottom as I bow to a passing elderly Japanese couple. And it is such an exact model of the real village of Packingham in-Stayle that there's even a miniature version of the miniature village in the Miniature Village, which of course provokes the question: is there also a miniature version of the miniature version of the miniature village in the Miniature Village?
Actually, Maggie and I discover, when we identify the centre of the village where the stream and bridges are, that it's an exact replica not of the village as it is today, but of the village as we might imagine it in that mythical golden age past. So there's no replica sprawl of cafe tables all along the riverside, no replica overflow of gift displays across the pavements, no replica Animal World, no replica earth-curved car park, no miniature cars – oh, except for one which is secured against thieves by what looks like a bath plug chain and small padlock – and most of all there are no hordes of replica people.
I'm not complaining. It's just that the Miniature Village, with its endless walls of dirty weathered stone, has a gloomy and deserted air. It's more like a haunted village in Transylvania than the vibrant jewel of regenerated villages in the English south-west. This impression is reinforced as we walk past the miniature parish church, through whose windows leak tape-recorded strains of what sounds like the most severe passage in Bach's Easter Oratorio, the sort of mood music Hammer House of Horror Films used to choose when the vampire's shadow stretched up the wall.
'Have you noticed something about our fellow visitors?' I ask Maggie.
She looks around. 'What's that?'
'No kids. They're all adults. Not a single child to be seen.'
'Could be a coincidence.'
'Could be. Or maybe today's kids are so used to exploring video game cities or watching cartoons of Postman Pat in Greendale Village, where everything's colour and fast movement, that this all just looks dead to them.'
Back outside in the land of toddlers, dogs, colour and fast movement, a woman screams as we draw level with her, pointing towards a clutch of five-year-olds pushing each other over in the water, 'Oy, Cameron, go back and get that bat! Now!' Obviously a Conservative supporter.
As we leave Packingham, driving past several car-packed fields advertising ALL DAY PARKING £2, Maggie asks, 'So, what do you think?'
'Well, I take your point that Packingham-in-Stayle is a brilliant place for all these millions of mums and dads and kids and grannies who visit it. And of course that means lots of jobs for the people who live here. But it just seems to be at the price of completely destroying what could be a charming village.'
'"Charming" huh? What would Ralph have to say about that? Wouldn't he say you're happy only if a village is turned into a tasteful little paradise for middle-class retirees? But if it's made into a paradise for ordinary working families, you don't like it.'
'I'm just saying it's not for me.'
'You've got to admire the commercial enterprise of the people of Packingham, though, haven't you?'
'Ah, there speaks a free-market capitalist businesswoman. Ralph would be on to you for that as well.' And as we pass a couple – Japanese probably – photographing some horses in a field by the main road, I add, 'I just think the place is OTT. If I'd wanted crowds, I'd have stayed living in London.'
CHAPTER 31
THE END IS NIGH...
BEWARE!
'Hmmmm.'
As a judgement, this is pretty damning. It comes from Tony, my old Oxford chum, the one with the strong views on the word 'community'. He's over from North Carolina and staying with us in Blockley for a few days. He's getting the VIP tour of the construction. We're standing in the living room next to a concrete mixer. Dave and Jonathan are slapping plaster on every visible bit of breeze block. And sludge and dust are sticking to our feet because Simon has been slicing the top off the concrete block, which one day will be a kitchen counter, with a super-sized circular saw that cools itself with water while it cuts. I've just told Tony we plan to move in here in three weeks' time. So, that 'Hmmmm' is an essay in scepticism.
But I'm not downhearted. I can dismiss Tony's comment, learned sage though he is, because 'Conversion of The Old Stables' is a specialist subject on which I could do a Master's degree based on eighteen months' practical experience.
Behind the dirt and apparen
t chaos, I can recognise the positive in having all these craftsmen working alongside each other. Michael the decorator has even started painting the main bedroom ceiling. In fact, there's only one real hurdle now to be leaped, and that's getting the limestone floor laid. Once the screed has fully dried out, we'll be able to get that done. Then it's a quick downhill dash – fitting the kitchen and finishing the bathrooms – and we'll be in. You can almost touch the hope in the air. And as Tony and I leave, I give a cheery wave to Bill, who's just finishing off his lecture before an audience of three Australians – a couple and what looks like their elderly father. 'So, how old do you think I am?' I hear him ask as we get into the car.
The limestone slabs are to be laid by the first woman to work on the project since Anthea drew up the plans. 'About time,' says Maggie. And I point out the symmetry. Anthea started the project. Flora – that's her name – will be finishing it off.
'Well, not quite,' says Maggie.
'As good as,' I reply.
So, as the big day approaches, Nik and Simon clear all the muck and junk off the screed floor. And when I call in at the site around 4.30, Mark the plumber is fixing the pump onto the end of the underfloor heating pipes. The system's got to be tested before the slabs go down.
The chippy's hung the oak doors in both places that Maggie and I agreed on.
Nik says, 'Are you ready for this?'
'What's that?' I ask.
'Sime, drum roll please.' He turns to Simon, who does a quick riff with his screwdriver on the lid of a toolbox. And Nik hands me a rusty bit of wire with three keys on it. 'There,' he says. 'That's official. It's now a house. Not a building site.'
It's an emotional moment. In my acceptance speech, I blend tears with thanks to everyone, from Maggie to the vicar's dog, which has demonstrated its support even in the darkest days. 'The yellow stain on the side wall should fade over time,' says Nik.
Eight a.m. the next morning I arrive on site at the house, to find Nik and Simon there already.
'I've just turned the heating on,' says Nik.
The three of us stare down, huddled, heads bowed and silent, like relatives gathered around the bed of a sick child in a Tolstoy novel. After five minutes, there's the first sign of life. Over in the far corner, I can just see the faint, dry outline of a heating pipe on the damp screed. Within a minute, the complete intestines of tubework are showing through like a primitive X-ray image.
I can't contain a little cheer.
'I told you it'd be all right,' says Nik and pats me on the back. 'We're good to go.'
'But no Flora,' says Simon.
She was supposed to be here first thing. Nik gives her a ring. 'OK, sure. We'll see you tomorrow then,' he ends, then turns to us. 'She's been on holiday in the States for the past two weeks. The plane only got in half an hour ago,' he explains. 'She's still waiting for her baggage. She's a good lass though. She's promised to get the job done in a week.'
'It's no bad thing,' says Simon. 'We can leave the heat on full blast now for twenty-four hours to get it nice and dry.'
So with nothing more for me to do here till tomorrow, I head off. Bill's struggling this morning. Standing round him are four French cyclists whose English is not up to a Gloucestershire stone mason's vocabulary. 'No, let me start again,' he's shouting. 'Me, seventy. My lads, fourteen. That's their age.'
That evening, Maggie and I go over the plan. If Flora sticks to her promise and gets it done in a week, we've got the kitchen units, oven, dishwasher and fridge-freezer all ready for Nik's lads to install them. And the company that does the marble kitchen worktop have said they only need a week from measuring up to fitting. We're due out of Mill Cottage in two and a half weeks, so all should be fine. We're prepared for decorators and carpenters to be working around us when we're in, and of course Bill will still be finishing the garden wall.
Still, we know by now there's usually some little hiccup along the way, so like the pro's we've now become, we make a Plan B. It runs like this. Instead of moving straight from Blockley to The Old Stables, we'd get the removals people to put the furniture into storage for a couple of days, and we could go and stay with our friends in Evesham or even at a local B & B.
That night we fall asleep still smiling, and dream long dreams of a perfect house in a pretty village.
Next morning, I'm up early and off to Stow. As I get out of the car in Back Walls, a green van pulls up in front of me. A young woman gets out and takes a toolbox from the back.
'Hello there,' I call out. 'You must be Flora.'
She gives me an empty look. 'No.' She shakes her head.
'So do you work with Flora?'
'No. Who's Flora?'
'Sorry, my mistake. Flora is our…' – the cogs of my brain can be heard engaging – '… floorer.'
'I'm Justine,' she says. 'I lay stone floors. Who are you?'
I apologise and explain. 'Did you have a nice time in the States?' I ask.
'Sensational,' she replies. And we're back on track.
The first I know that something's wrong is when we bump into Michael the decorator coming round the corner of the block wall.
'It's a disaster area,' he says. 'The whole place is awash. There's nothing I can do.' And he stamps past us, paint cans clanking in his fists.
I rush on ahead of Justine and there inside our house I see it for myself.
There's water everywhere.
The newly plastered walls look like someone's been hosing them down all night. The giant window panes are the same. Water's streaming down them and standing in deep puddles on the concrete screed. Where Michael had already painted the ceiling, there are brown swirls on buckled boarding. As for the oak columns, they look like the trunks of mangrove trees sticking out of a Florida swamp. The door frame is so swollen with the water it's sucked up that when I try to open the French windows to let some of the water wash out, they won't shift.
I utter one unwholesome word, and my mouth stays open.
Justine crouches down and puts her hand flat on the boggy floor. 'I think it's the heating,' she says.
I visualise a leak in the system, of domestic tsunami proportions. 'The screed must have a huge amount of water in it,' she adds, 'and with the temperature in the piping sky-high, it's all been evaporating.' She looks around. 'It was chilly last night. So, the moist air's been condensing on the glass and on the ceilings and walls, turning into water again. Then it's all streaming back down to the floor, and around it goes again.'
I can see what she means. It's a vicious cycle of flooding.
'So where's all this water coming from in the first place?' I plead. 'The screed's been drying out for the past two weeks.' She looks puzzled, and I go on, 'It can't be coming out of the underfloor heating pipes, can it? Can it?' Surely it can't.
At that moment, Nik arrives.
'Christ!' That's all he says, before paddling across the room.
Justine's left. Like Michael, there's nothing for her to do.
Nik's trying to look nonplussed, as he pulls away the loose, sopping plasterboard, puts his hand against the rivulets of water chasing down the glass, and stirs a puddle with his boot.
'It's terrible,' I say. 'How's this happened?'
Nik shakes his head, and walks into the end bedroom. 'It's the same in here,' he calls. I go into the other rooms. In our bedroom, the plaster has broken away from the wall in a 3-foot-long chunk, and in the bathroom there's a pond several inches deep. In the kitchen, the water's condensing on the ceiling then pouring onto Nigel's massive cross beam. From there it's spouting down to the floor, where I can make out steam rising.
Back in the living room, Nik takes a deep breath. 'First thing,' he says, 'is to do a pressure test on the heating system. See if it's losing water.' He phones Mark the plumber to get him to come over. He's working the other side of the county, so we'll have to wait two hours before he can get to us.
I call Maggie. I can hear she's as close to tears as I am, telling her. 'What about all
the work we've done so far? I mean the plastering and painting. And the oak. What's going to happen to the oak? And all that heating stuff under the floor?'
'I don't know,' I say. 'I don't know.' She'll call in for an update on the way to the shop.
Meanwhile, Nik's got hold of a broom and he's attempting to swill some of the puddles out of the door. It's strange though. Within minutes of a patch being cleared, the water just appears again as though in some diabolic conjuring trick.
'I'm afraid it's not worth bothering to try and brush it out,' he says. 'And I've turned off the heating. But the concrete'll retain the heat for hours.' And with that, Nik too leaves saying, 'Mark'll be here in a couple of hours. I'll be back by then.'
A Horse in the Bathroom Page 25