by Isabel Wolff
“A pint of white wine, please,” I quipped happily, “and a packet of pork scratchings.”
He gave me a filthy look. He was clearly immune to my charm. “I’m not a bloody barman,” he said testily. “I own this gallery.”
“Well I’m sure that’s very nice for you,” I replied, “but my friend and I would like a drink.” My hackles, needless to say, were vertical.
“Get it yourself,” he said, nodding at the bottles of table wine.
“Thanks very much,” I said curtly. “Kate, would you like bad red, or bad white?”
“Red,” she said, reddening. “Tiffany, let’s go and look at the pictures.”
“What a rude man,” I said in a deliberately loud voice as she led me away by the sleeve.
“Shhh. Don’t react. It’s not worth it.”
“He owns this gallery and he treats guests like that! How does he sell any pictures?”
This was actually rather a good question. How indeed? Eric’s work consisted of body parts, photographed from odd angles and blown up to huge proportions. A woman’s foot, so enlarged as to give the dainty bones the scale of gothic fan vaulting; a clenched fist photographed in such a way that it looked like a range of jagged hills; an ear lying, like a huge conch shell, on a deserted beach; an enormous blue eye, like a lake; a pair of cavernous nostrils, three feet across.
“Snot very good,” I said to Kate. “It’s really interesting,” I lied to Eric two minutes later. “Terribly original and thought-provoking. I love conceptual art.”
“My work is about the topography of the body,” he explained seriously. “We each have a physical landscape with ridges, and furrows and crests . . .”
“. . . and plains.”
“. . . yes, and plains.”
“. . . and crags.”
“. . . yes, and crags.”
“. . . and grassy knolls.”
“. . . yes, yes, quite.”
“. . . and peaks,” I said.
“. . . yes. And peaks.”
“Mine are size thirty-eight, ha ha ha!”
He didn’t seem to find that funny. “Please don’t trivialize my work, Tiffany.”
“Sorry,” I said, “but really, I do think your work is awfully interesting.” Why don’t you try watercolors of Norfolk instead? I looked around. The crowd certainly was interesting—very modern, very chic. Lots of men, giggling.
“—ooh Kevin, you are a one!”
“—Saatchi was here earlier, you know.”
“—Tracey Emin—fabulous.”
“—give me Marcel Duchamp any day.”
“—did you hear Damien on Kaleidoscope?”
“—uses his own blood.”
“—I hear Oscar Reeds is in big trouble.”
“—Brit Art is really great.”
“—gallery’s been threatened with closure.”
“—waxwork ding-dong.”
“—no money.”
“—I prefer American minimalism myself.”
And as we circulated it was the detail that jumped out. A man with a heart-shaped birthmark on his right cheek; a late sixty-something woman with a suspiciously taut lower face; a young chap in his twenties, with hair as white as Warhol’s. And people weren’t really looking at the pictures at all—they were looking at each other. Women discreetly eyeing men. Men eyeing men. Men eyeing women.
“What the hell’s that man staring at?” I suddenly said to Kate. She followed my gaze.
“You, you idiot,” she said. “Look, I’ve got a really bad headache. You stay a bit longer, but I’d quite like to go home. Do you mind?”
“Er no,” I said.
“And also, I’d like to see Mike,” she admitted, blushing visibly.
“That’s all right, Kate. You don’t have to explain,” I said. That’s the last I’ll see of her for a bit, I thought ruefully as she left. I decided to stay a little longer. Perhaps have another chat with Eric. But that bloke was still staring at me. Did he know me? He certainly looked vaguely familiar. And then he began moving in on me. He was about five foot ten with dark curly hair and a long, Paxmanesque nose. About forty-five. Where had I seen him before?
“Hellooo,” he said, extending his hand. “Mungo Brown.” Mungo Brown. Now that was quite familiar. But whence?
“I know that name,” I said. “But I don’t know why. Have we ever met?”
He chuckled. “No, we haven’t. Because if we had, I would certainly have remembered your name.” Oh, what a nice thing to say, I thought happily.
“My name’s Tiffany,” I said. “Tiffany Trott. Now, why do I think I know you?”
“Well, ha ha ha!” He coughed delicately. “I think it’s because, well, you’ve probably seen me . . .”
“On the number 731!” I said.
“No. On the television, actually.” Television? Television? Oh yes. Of course.
“Got it,” I said happily. “You’re a reporter.”
“Correspondent, actually,” he said slightly huffily. “Special Correspondent. Social Affairs. ITN.” Oh yes.
“I’m sorry I didn’t remember you straightaway,” I said, “but to be quite honest the only reporters who stick in my mind are those incredibly brave foreign reporters, like George Alagiah, John Simpson, James Mates . . .”
“Yes, yes,” he said distractedly.
“. . . Mike Nicholson, Lindsey Hilsum, Bridget Kendall . . .”
“OK, OK.”
“. . . and of course Kate Adie.” He rolled his eyes. “But I’m afraid when it comes to domestic news the names don’t really register at all. What have you done recently?”
“A very interesting piece for News at Ten on problems in the Welsh clam industry.”
“Oh, is there much to say about that?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said, “clams have a lot to tell us . . . look, I’m really rather bored of this show. Would you like to come and have a drink with me?” Gosh—very forward. Ummmmm.
“OK,” I said. “Why not?” I said goodbye to Eric, gave Oscar Reeds a valedictory glare, then exited with my new acquaintance.
“Where shall we go?” he said
“The Ritz!” I said. “It’s not far.” And we might see Seriously Successful, whom I love.
“Er, I don’t think I want to go there,” he said. “My tie’s not quite smart enough for that.”
“Oh, I think your tie’s fine,” I said.
“Let’s go to the Red Lion,” he said. “It’s just behind St. James’s church.”
So we did. And he bought me a half of lager, and he sat there and told me all about himself.
“I’m just getting divorced,” he explained. “I was married for fifteen years. My wife didn’t understand me. I said she should go to a shrink. She said she didn’t need one. Bloody ridiculous.” He was really rather an attractive man, I thought to myself as he talked away. And he’s getting divorced. Ah ha. And he had a good job. A very good job. And that would go down well at the tennis club, wouldn’t it? “Oh hallo, Mrs. Chumleigh, this is my husband. Mungo Brown. Yes that’s right. The Mungo Brown. Yes you have seen him. On the television. That’s why he looks so familiar. Yes, that’s right. On ITN. After the break.” Mmmmmm. Wonder how encumbered he is.
“Do you have any children?” I inquired with a casual air.
“Yes,” he said. “Five.” Five! For crying out loud. Still, perhaps they were all grown up and off his hands.
“They’re eleven, seven, five, three and eighteen months,” he explained.
“Oh. Lovely ages. Lovely ages,” I said, while mentally deleting him from my list of potential life partners. Damn and blast. He really was rather good-looking. But then, on the other hand, I do like kids—I could be like Maria with the von Trapp children. All singing songs and escaping dangerous situations and doing amusing things in harmony. I could hear them now. “Oh Tiffany, we’re so lucky to have you as our stepmother.”
“Can I get you another drink?” I said to Mungo.
> He gave me a grateful smile. “Yes please,” he said. “I’ll have a triple Grouse.”
December
Canned carols. Hateful holly. Crass cards. Grotty grottoes. Miserable mistletoe. Tedious, tawdry tinsel. Effing fairy on top of the evergreen, plastic tree. Santa and Rufus and sleighbells going ring ting ling a ling, ring ting ling a ling ling! Gosh I love Christmas! The Salvation Army band. Piping choristers with apple-cheeks and crisp, pleated ruffs. Sitting by a blazing log fire with the man of your dreams, joking and laughing and . . . oh God oh God oh God—it’s that time of year again. The Bleak Midwinter. Jingle Bells. Such a wonderful time for us Single Belles. Deck the Halls with Boughs of Holly, tra la la la la—tra la la la! ’Tis the Season to be Jolly Pissed off, actually. And, of course, Christmas is all about babies, isn’t it? Being “in the sixth month” and all that, swaddling clothes and cribs and all the rest of it, and then giving birth in some sub-NHS middle-eastern manger with a steady stream of concerned visitors.
Siii-lent Night. Ho-ooly Night, droned Bing Crosby in Selfridges today. And the annoying thing was—I mean talk about the potency of cheap music—but the annoying thing was that it really got to me. I tried not to let it, but it did. In fact, it was extremely embarrassing.
“Why are you crying, Tiffany?” Alice demanded as we stood in the queue for Father Christmas on the fourth floor.
“DON’T ask her THAT,” shouted Amy. “Tiffany’s CRYING because SHE’S NOT MARRIED. She HASN’T got a HUSBAND. She hasn’t EVEN got a BOYFRIEND. THAT’S her PROBLEM.”
“I am not crying because of that,” I said indignantly, while wondering what on earth Lizzie said about me to the girls when I wasn’t there. “I’m simply crying because I’ve got some dust trapped under my contact lenses, that’s all.”
“Of course you have, Tiffany,” said Lizzie handing me a tissue. “OK Alice and Amy—don’t forget, one request only.”
“Oh Mummy,” they wailed.
“Last year they asked for sixty-three things each,” she said. “It was hideously embarrassing. They’d brought a list and refused to leave until they’d got to the end of it. I had to drag them out. Hope it’s not the same man this year. And if he attempts to sit either of them on his knee,” she added fiercely, “I’m suing.”
“Look, I’ll wait outside,” I said. “There’s no need for me to come in too.” I wandered down to Menswear to get a tie for Dad. I looked through all the different makes. Dunhill, that might do. Lanvin—lovely, but a bit flash for him. Yves St. Laurent—not quite his thing. Ralph Lauren . . . Ralph Lauren . . . that reminded me. It reminded me of the time I bought Phillip a silk tie from Thomas Pink. It was rather nice, silvery-gray with a scattering of tiny scarlet motifs. It wasn’t for his birthday or for Christmas. It was just a present. And I felt quite shy about giving it to him because I hadn’t been going out with him that long—just a couple of months—and I really, really hoped he’d like it and I knew that it would go with his favorite gray suit. But when he opened it, he looked at the label and his face fell, and he said that he wouldn’t accept it because he only wore ties from Ralph Lauren. I bet Seriously Successful wouldn’t have done that, I thought to myself. If I’d given him a tie, he wouldn’t have said to me, “Look, I’m sorry, but I only wear Hermès ties.” He’d have said, “How lovely, Tiffany. Thanks very much. I really like it.” And I think he’d have said that even if he hated it. Even if he thought it was the most hideous tie ever produced in the history of neckwear. Because Seriously Successful may have a wife, and quite possibly a girlfriend too, but he’s also got good manners. I bought Dad a nice tweedy, speckly sort of tie in olive green, and then met Lizzie and the girls in the mezzanine café.
“God it was embarrassing,” said Lizzie as Alice and Amy went up to get some more cake.
“Why?” I said. “Did they ask for too many things?”
“No. It wasn’t that. It was the fact that I knew Santa! I recognized him from drama school. He was the star of my year—he played Romeo. And after that I saw him on TV once or twice and then he seemed to disappear. And here he is—in the Selfridges Christmas grotto.”
“Did you say anything to him?”
“Of course not!”
“Why not—did you think he’d be embarrassed?”
“No. It’s just that the girls believe in Father Christmas. How could I say, ‘Hallo, Jeffrey, I remember you from drama school.’ The game would really be up then.”
I caught the number 73 home, while they took a cab back to Hampstead. And I sat staring out of the window, at the tinsel-dressed windows, and the frosted glass, and the bright lights swinging overhead in the stiff breeze, and the souped-up synthesized carols kept circulating in my head. No crib for a bed . . . lays down his sweet head . . . infant lowly, infant holy . . . he smiles within his cra-adle . . . a babe with face so bright. And I thought about babies, as I often do these days, and wondered whether I would ever have my own special delivery. A sweet little cherub, with downy head and huge blue eyes and bendy little arms and legs and . . . oh God, what a din! I wish that baby would shut up! I turned round and glared. Some people just let their babies scream their heads off on public transport, don’t they? Waah! Waah! Waah! Totally sickening for everyone else. Where was I? . . . oh yes. Babies. The infant Jesus. Christmas. And, to make things worse, the forecast is for snow.
That nice man John Kettley was right. Six inches came. Overnight. This morning I walked down to Highbury Fields, my feet crunching into the thick layer of glistening, pristine white. The air was clear and clean. The sky a refulgent blue. Snowflakes drifted down from the trees, and were whipped up by the thin, sharp wind into meringue-like peaks and folds. And the roar of the traffic was dulled by this dense, blue-white blanket. All you could hear was the shrieking and laughter of a hundred children at play. There they were, all bobble-hatted and cherry-cheeked, being pulled along on toboggans, pelting each other with snowballs or building portly, serious-looking snowmen.
“Mummy! Mummy! Faster! Faster!” a little boy yelled as his mother pulled him along behind her on a plastic sled. They were both giggling, almost hysterical. I thrust my hands deeper into my pockets and turned up the collar of my old loden coat. The snow crunched and groaned underfoot, the sharp sunlight stung my eyes. And as I stood watching them I wondered whether I could ever go it alone. On my own. With a baby. Whether I could be a single mother. A lone parent. Like Sally. Sally! Of all people. I mean, I just couldn’t believe it. Of all the women I know, Sally was always the least likely to go down that road. Sally, who just a few months ago said that she would never ever have a baby without a bloke, is intending to do just that.
“I’ve known for sure since mid-October,” she said last night as we sat at my kitchen table, “although I didn’t want to say anything in case it didn’t, you know, happen. But now I know it’s definitely on its way.”
“When?” I asked.
“May.”
“Wow! Well, um, congratulations!” Is that what one said on these occasions? Were congratulations necessarily in order when one’s single girlfriends announced that they were pregnant? I wasn’t at all sure. I looked at her—she certainly looked very happy. And she looked different. Her face seemed to shine as if something was radiating her from within. Her eyes were animated and lucent, not red-rimmed from lack of sleep. And she hadn’t got out her laptop all evening. She had sat with me in my kitchen, talking and laughing—though I had wondered why she’d refused to drink, just as she had at the firework party—and then, as we sat down to eat a looping mound of spaghetti carbonara, she had quietly dropped her bombshell.
“I’ve found the way,” she concluded happily as she replaced her fork on her plate. So that’s what her bizarre answer phone message was about. “I’ve found the way,” she repeated. “And this is it. At least, for me. Aren’t you going to ask me who the father is?” she added mysteriously.
“No,” I said, “I’m not. Because it’s absolutely none of my business. Er . . . i
s it anyone I know?”
“No,” she replied with an odd little laugh. “It’s no one I really know either.” Curiouser and curiouser.
“He was my guide,” she explained. “On holiday, in Rajasthan in August. A well-heeled young English guy working for the company, doing lecture tours of the Mogul palaces. We were all staying in the Lake Palace at Udaipur and, one night . . . well, it’s a very romantic spot.”
“I know,” I said. “That’s where William Hague went on honeymoon. Are you going to tell him? I don’t mean William Hague,” I added quickly. “I mean, your um, your um, father. Not your father, though you probably are telling your father—I mean the chap. The father of your child.”
“No,” she said. “I’m not.”
“Why not?”
“Because he’s only twenty-two.” Gosh. “And he’s about to start a Ph.D. at Oxford in Indian architecture. How could I impose a responsibility like that on him just as he’s starting out?”
“But he might want to know,” I pointed out.
“I very much doubt it,” she said. “And it’s better if he doesn’t. What good would it do? We’re not in a relationship, and we’re never going to be in one. It was just, you know, a moment really. And anyway, it’s my choice to have the baby. Not his. I mean, no one has to have a baby, do they?”
“Did you do it on purpose?” I asked.
“No,” she said thoughtfully. “But nor did I take any particular measures to avoid an ‘accident.’ ”
“Nor did he, it seems.”
“I know. But he’s very young. And a bit silly. And he believed me when I said he didn’t have to worry.”
“Oh. Oh. I see.”
“In any case his parents are very pukka, rather uptight people from what he said. I’m sure they’d be absolutely horrified. Just like mine are.”
“Are they?”
“Yes. Completely. Can’t accept it at all, though I guess they probably will when they see the baby.”
“But you said your parents would love you to have a baby. You said they were always going on about how much they’d like to have grandchildren.”