‘Are you going to have some?’
‘Of course I am. You don’t imagine I go to work on an empty stomach.’
He went over to the little cooker, switched it on, opened the fridge, took out a packet of bacon. Gabriel pulled a chair away from the table and sat and watched him. He looked, she thought, marvellously dishevelled, like an advertisement for Eau Savage.
She said, ‘Where do you work?’
‘I have part shares in a small furniture factory, up on the moor at a place called Carnellow.’
‘Have you lived here long?’
‘Only a year.’ He plugged in the electric kettle, put bread in the toaster. ‘I rent this place from Gerald. It used to be a coach house, but he converted it.’ He found a tin and started spooning coffee into an enamel jug. ‘You’ve been in Virginia, haven’t you?’
‘Yes. But not for a bit. For the last six months I’ve been in the Virgin Islands, living on a yacht.’
He turned to grin at her over his shoulder. ‘Have you? How fantastic. The lotus eater’s dream. Is that where you’ve come from?’
‘Yes. Saint Thomas to Saint Croix, Saint Croix to San Juan, San Juan to Miami, Miami to Kennedy, Kennedy to London…’
‘London to Tremenheere.’
‘Right.’
The crisp smell of bacon filled the room mingled with the aroma of coffee. From a cupboard he took plates, cups, saucers; from a drawer, knives and forks. He dumped all these on the table. ‘Be a good girl and lay the table, would you?’ He went back to the cooker. ‘One egg or two?’
‘Two,’ said Gabriel, who, once again, was feeling famished. She set out the china and the cutlery.
‘What else do we need?’ he asked.
She tried to remember traditional British breakfasts. ‘Marmalade? Honey? Porridge? Kidneys? Kedgeree?’
‘Don’t get overexcited.’
‘Butter, then.’
He found some in the fridge, a pale yellow chunk on an earthenware dish, dumped it on the table, returned to his cooking.
He said, ‘What were the Virgin Islands like?’
‘Full of mosquitoes.’
‘You have to be joking!’
‘But perfect if you were at sea.’
‘Where were you based?’
‘Saint Thomas.’
‘Where did you sail?’
‘Everywhere. Saint John. Virgin Gorda…’ His back view was the most attractive back view she had ever seen, even, dressed as he was, in a bathrobe and with his hair on end. He had the most beautiful, capable hands.… ‘Norman Island.’
‘Norman Island. Sounds like a hairdresser.’
‘The original Treasure Island. You know. Robert Louis Stevenson.’
‘Did he go there?’
‘Must have.’
He piled the bacon and eggs onto two plates, carried them over to the table. ‘Is that enough for you?’
‘More than enough.’
‘I can add tomatoes. If you want mushrooms and kidneys, you’ll have to wait while I make a quick dash down to the post office in the village.’
‘I don’t want them.’
‘Coffee, then?’
‘Lovely.’
He sat down opposite her. ‘Go on about Norman Island.’
‘Nothing to go on about.’
‘Banyan trees and white strands.’
‘You’ve got it in one.’
‘Why did you leave?’
Gabriel picked up her fork in her right hand, saw that he was watching her, transferred the fork to her left hand, and picked up a knife in her right hand.
He said, ‘Transatlantic customs.’
‘I forget easily. I’m in Britain now.’
‘We are divided by a common language.’
‘But you make great ham and eggs.’
‘Why did you leave?’
She looked down at her plate, shrugged. ‘Oh, time to come home, I guess.’
It was a delicious breakfast, but he did not linger. With his second cup of coffee in his hand, he told Gabriel that he had to go and shave. But before he did this, he went to open the door, to check on the morning situation in the big house.
‘Not a movement. Nor a stir. It’s only half past eight. There won’t be a face at the window for another half hour.’ He came back into the room, leaving the door open. Sunshine was beginning to seep into the courtyard. A long golden diamond of it lay on the scrubbed wooden floor. ‘Can you look after yourself while I go up to dress?’
‘Of course.’
‘You don’t have to do the washing up’—he headed for the open staircase—‘but it would be nice if you did.’
She said, ‘I don’t know who you are.’
Halfway up, he turned, looking down at her from eyes as brightly blue as hummingbird feathers, or the water at Caneel Bay, or speedwells.
‘I’m sorry, didn’t I tell you? Eve’s my mother.’
‘But I still don’t know your name.’
‘It’s Ivan Ashby.’
He disappeared upstairs. His footsteps moved overhead. Presently she heard the radio turned on, cheerful, early-morning music. A tap ran water into a basin.
Ivan Ashby.
Gabriel pushed back her chair, gathered up the breakfast dishes, and took them to the sink. She washed everything up, stacking it neatly in a rack to dry. With this done, she went out into the courtyard. Overhead a flock of white doves fluttered, settling on the bleached tiles of a pigeon cote. No movement showed in the big house. An upstairs window still had the curtains drawn.
But there was another cottage in the courtyard, and this had already wakened. Smoke blew from the single chimney and the door stood open. As Gabriel watched, a figure appeared in this doorway, a girl, wearing a long dark skirt and a white garment, like a choirboys’ surplice, touched here and there with bedraggled lace. She paused, savouring the warm freshness of the summer morning, and then, with a sort of timeless grace, settled herself on the doorstep in the sun.
Intriguing. A young woman emerging from her house at eight o’clock in the morning and simply sitting down, doing nothing, was a charming novelty.
What is this life so full of care.
We have no time to stop and stare.
Gabriel stared. The girl, becoming aware that she was being watched, looked up and saw her.
She said, ‘Hello.’
‘Hello,’ said Gabriel.
‘Lovely morning.’
‘Yes.’ She began to walk over towards the cottage. ‘You’ve got the right idea.’
The girl was quite young, with a small head made enormous by a frizzy mop of pale hair. Her feet were bare, her hands covered with rings. She said, ‘Where have you sprung from?’
She looked like an insubstantial gipsy, but her voice was bright and strong, with the long vowels of the North Country.
‘I’ve just arrived. Got off the train this morning.’
Gabriel had reached her side. The girl shunted herself along the doorstep, making space, and Gabriel sat beside her.
‘I’m Drusilla,’ said the girl.
‘I’m Gabriel.’
‘Have you come to stay?’
‘I hope so.’
‘Join the club, then!’
‘Do you live here?’
‘Yes. I’ve got a baby inside. He hasn’t woken up yet, that’s why I’m sitting here. Nice to have a bit of peace.’
‘How long have you lived here?’
‘Oh, a month or two. Before that I was out at Lanyon. But I’ve been down in this part of the world for about a year.’
‘Do you work here?’
‘No, I’m not working. Just looking after Josh. I’m a flautist,’ she added.
‘Sorry?’
‘A flautist. I play the flute.’
‘Do you?’ More and more intriguing. ‘Professionally?’
‘That’s right. Professionally. Used to play in an orchestra in Huddersfield—that’s my hometown—but then the orchestra ran out of funds, and
I haven’t really worked since. I went to London to try to get a job there, but I didn’t have any luck.’
‘So what did you do?’
‘Well, I met this man. Kev. He was a painter. He had a little place in Earls Court, so I moved in with him for a bit. He didn’t have much luck in London, either, so we decided to come down here. Some chums of his were here already, and they helped us find somewhere to live. We got this little house out on the moor at Lanyon, but it wasn’t much of a place. Nothing like this. Didn’t even have a lavatory.’
‘How old is your baby?’
‘Ten months.’
‘And … are you and Kev still together?’
‘God, no. He lit out on me. Went back to London. I had to get out of the cottage—the man who owned it wouldn’t let me stay there on my own. Anyroad, I couldn’t pay the rent.’
‘What did you do?’
‘Couldn’t do much, could I? Got out. Mathie Thomas—do you know Mathie Thomas?’
‘I don’t know anybody.’
‘He took me in for a night or two, and then Ivan found me this place. Ivan’s Mathie’s partner.’
‘He’s just given me breakfast.’
‘Has he?’ Drusilla smiled. ‘Isn’t he smashing? I think he’s a lovely person. Really fancy him. Wouldn’t mind taking up with Ivan any day of the week.’
‘… his mother…?’
‘Eve? She’s a lovely person too. And the Admiral. Have you met the Admiral?’
‘I told you, I don’t know anybody.’
‘We’re a regular commune, I can tell you.’ Gabriel had caught Drusilla in one of her expansive moods. ‘There’s an old nanny as well, older than God she is, and twice as disagreeable.’ She thought this over. ‘No’—she wrinkled her nose—‘that’s not fair. She’s not a bad old thing. She goes to Truro every Wednesday, it’s her day off, and I asked her to buy a bottle of Ribena for Josh, because I can’t get it in the post office, and she brought him back a little rabbit. Not a real one, a toy one, with a ribbon round its neck. He’d never had a toy like that before. I thought it was really kind of her. But her face when she handed it over! Sour as an old prune. Some people are funny, no doubt. There’s none so queer as old folks.’
‘Who else is there?’
‘There’s Laura. Some relation of the Admiral’s. Here to convalesce. She’d had an operation. She doesn’t live here, though. Just staying. And then there are various hangers-on. You know, popping in and out. There’s the gardener, and his wife—she helps in the house sometimes. And a woman called Mrs Marten who lives in the village, but I can’t stand her.’
‘Does she help in the house, too?’
‘God, no. She’s a friend of Eve’s. I think she’s a toffee-nosed bitch. Never handed me a good word, never so much as looks at Josh. And never a day passes but she isn’t here for some reason or another. Taking advantage. You know.’
Gabriel, who did not know but was loath to stem this flood of fascinating information, nodded.
‘To tell the truth, I think she resents me being here, wants to be the only pebble on the beach. She was up for a drink the other evening.… They were all sitting outside Ivan’s house in the sun and drinking champagne, and the Admiral asked me to join them. But when I saw her there as well, I said I wouldn’t and came into the house and shut the door. And it was champagne they were drinking, too. I wouldn’t have minded.…’
She stopped. From behind them, in the house, came the indignant wail of a small child, just woken, and thinking itself abandoned.
‘That’s Josh,’ said Drusilla and got up and went indoors. A moment later she appeared again, bearing the baby in her arms. She sat down and set him on his fat bare feet between her knees. He wore a shrunken nightgown and was immensely fat and brown, with sparse hair and black, boot-button eyes.
‘Who’s my duck, then?’ Drusilla asked him tenderly and pressed a kiss into his fat neck.
He took no notice of her, being absorbed in Gabriel. After a bit he smiled, revealing a small tooth or two. Gabriel put out her hand and he clutched at her finger and tried to put it into his mouth. When she would not let him he roared in rage, and Drusilla bent to kiss him again, hold him close, rock him lazily to and fro.
‘Did you…?’ Gabriel asked. ‘When you were having a baby, did you ever think about having an abortion?’
Drusilla looked up, wrinkling her nose in disgust.
‘God no. What a gruesome idea. Not have Josh?’
Gabriel said, ‘I’m having a baby.’
‘Are you?’ Drusilla’s voice was not only delighted, but interested. ‘When?’
‘Ages yet. I mean, I’ve only just realized that I am having a baby. You’re the first person I’ve told.’
‘Get away.’
‘You won’t say anything, will you?’
‘I won’t say a word. Do you know who the father is?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Does he know?’
‘No. And he isn’t going to.’
Drusilla smiled approvingly. This sort of independent stand was right up her street.
‘Good for you,’ she said.
* * *
May, lying in bed, with her teeth in a tumbler beside her, awoke to the soft murmur of voices beneath her window. Last night, she had worked for a bit at her scrapbook, stuck in some lovely pictures, and then watched television till there was nothing left to watch. But in old age, sleep did not come easily, and the new day was dawning before she finally dropped off. Now …
She put a hand out and found her spectacles, fumbling, got them on. She picked up her watch. A quarter to nine. Changed days. In the old days, she’d been out of bed at six thirty, and sometimes sooner if there was a baby to be fed. The voices murmured on, making, she decided, a pleasant sound. She wondered who was there.
After a bit, she got out of bed, put in her teeth, and pulled on her dressing gown. She went to the window and drew back the curtains. Below, the courtyard lay washed in the first sunshine of another fine day. Outside Drusilla’s cottage Drusilla sat with Joshua and a girl beside her. One of her funny friends, no doubt.
She did not lean out of the window, because that was not May’s way. She watched them. The new girl wore trousers, had dyed-looking hair. May pursed her lips, settling her dentures. She saw Ivan come out of his house and walk across the courtyard towards the two girls.
‘Anybody stirred yet?’ he asked them. May opened her window. ‘I’m stirring,’ she told him. He stopped and looked up. ‘Morning, May.’
‘What are you all doing down there, chattering?’ May wanted to know.
‘May, be an angel and go and see if my mother’s awake. Now. I’ve got to go to work and I want to see her before I leave.’
‘I’ll have to get me clothes on.’
‘No time. Go now. You look smashing in your dressing gown.’
May bridled. ‘Get away.’ But she shut the window and turned back into her room. She found her bedroom slippers and put them on, went out of the door and down the passage. Outside Gerald and Eve’s bedroom, she paused, listening. They were talking. She knocked.
Eve sat up in her side of the big, padded bed, with a shawl around her shoulders, drinking her morning cup of tea. Gerald, up and dressed, was sitting at the end of her chaise longue tying his shoelaces. Encouraged by the continuing good weather, she was trying to talk him into the idea of a lunch picnic the following day. ‘… we could go to Gwenvoe and walk along the cliffs for a bit. I haven’t been there for ages, and there wouldn’t be any people there to kick sand in your face. Do say you’ll come. I think we all need to get away from the house.…’
A knock on the door. Eve instantly felt apprehensive. After the letter, she felt apprehensive all the time, and even more so when May’s face appeared around the edge of the door.
‘May, what is it?’
‘Ivan wants you. He’s out in the courtyard.’
‘Ivan? What’s happened? What’s the matter?’
‘I don’t think anything’s the matter. Just says he wants a word before he goes to the factory. Drusilla’s out there too, and another girl … think she must be friend of Drusilla’s. Got dyed hair.’
‘Heavens,’ said Eve.
‘Ivan says to come.’
‘Thank you, May. I’ll be there in a moment.’
The door closed. ‘Gerald, why have I got to go and see Ivan and a girl with dyed hair?’
‘Don’t look so worried. It sounds interesting. I shall come with you.’
‘All the time, I think something terrible’s going to happen.…’
‘You mustn’t.’ She turned back the covers and got out of bed, dropping her shawl. Gerald got to his feet and helped her on with her pale blue quilted robe. He said, ‘Do you think the girl with dyed hair belongs to Drusilla or to Ivan?’
Despite herself, Eve had to smile. ‘Oh, don’t say things like that!’
‘You know, Tremenheere was very dull until I married you. I hope she’s not another lame duck.’
‘A lame duck with dyed hair?’
‘The imagination boggles,’ said Gerald.
They went together down the back stairs and through the kitchen. The table was laid with three places for breakfast. Laura’s tray waited on the dresser. Gerald unbolted the back door and opened it.
‘We thought you were never going to appear,’ Ivan told them.
‘What’s so urgent?’ Gerald asked. Eve looked over his shoulder. Drusilla’s friend. She had been sitting on the doorstep of the cottage, but now she stood up and came towards them. She was tall and slender, long-legged. Her face brown, her hair the colour of straw. She had, Eve had time to notice, remarkably beautiful grey eyes.
From her doorway, Drusilla and the baby watched.
‘Do you know who this is?’ Ivan asked. It was unlike Ivan to ask idiotic questions. How could she and Gerald know who she was? Eve shook her head.
‘Gabriel,’ said Ivan.
* * *
Lucy was not well. In the middle of the night, she had woken Laura, standing on her back legs by the bed, scratching at the sheet and whining miserably. In the still darkness, Laura had carried her downstairs, unbolted the front door, and taken Lucy out into the garden, where she had promptly been sick. Upstairs again, she had drunk copiously from her water bowl and then gone back to her basket, digging her way in under her blanket, for warmth.
Voices In Summer Page 19