Pratt a Manger

by David Nobbs

  They didn’t entirely forsake their principles, though. They wouldn’t dream of buying some small place that might suit a young plumber or bus driver. They would buy a house so large that the locals wouldn’t have been able to afford it in any case.

  They led busy lives and the search for their rural paradise took a long time. The manuscript for The Pratt Diet was coming along very slowly. Every house that they saw seemed to have a snag.

  The new millennium began. In Uganda, up to five hundred members of the millennium cult, The Movement of the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God, were killed in a church fire. Police believed it was murder after cult members had demanded their money back when the cult’s prophecy that the world would end on the last day of December, 1999 had failed to materialise.

  In May, 2000, Ken Livingston was elected Mayor of London, and Henry and Hilary found The Old Manor House in Grayling-under-Witchwood, a pleasantly straggling village in the North Cotswolds, away from the most touristy areas.

  The house was a dream, with three gables and mullioned windows, built in honeyed stone, mellow, English, and exquisite. There was a mature mauve wisteria on the front, and a fig tree on a sheltered wall in the garden. It was set back from the village street, and at the rear, apart from one simple cottage in the same honeyed stone, there was open country. Some lambs were having a game, leaping and racing with sheer exultation at the privilege of existence. The place was perfect. Surely there would be no drawbacks here?

  ‘There’s only one snag,’ said Mr Flitch, of Abercrombie, Abercrombie, Abercrombie, Abercrombie, Abercrombie and Flitch.

  A snag! Again! What would it be this time?

  ‘A snag?’ said Henry with a heavy heart.

  ‘A very small snag. The lady who lives in that cottage …’ He pointed to the honeyed stone cottage … ‘believes that she has a right of way through your land. She thinks that that track …’ He pointed to a track that ran along the eastern boundary of the garden. ‘… gives her access to the village. There is no gate at the back of your garden but you would be fully entitled to put one up.’

  ‘Does she have any other access to her cottage?’

  ‘Oh yes. Her front door is on the other side, but it’s a long, bumpy track to the road. To the shop via that track is one point eight miles. Via your track it’s nought point four. You can see why she uses it, but she doesn’t need to. The previous occupants chose to turn a blind eye.’

  ‘What’s this woman like?’ asked Henry.

  ‘Oh, Mrs Scatchard is very quiet. She’s middle–aged. These things are subjective, and perhaps I shouldn’t say it, but she’s no oil painting. I’m amazed she ever married. There’s a bit of a mystery, I suppose, in that nobody knows much about her. The village thinks her eccentric, but pleasant. In any case she isn’t here very often. I can’t see her being a major problem.’

  Nor could Henry and Hilary.

  They explored the village a couple of times, shopped in the Post Office cum village store, had a drink in both pubs, warmed to one of them, and decided that they liked the feel of the place. They bought The Old Manor House.

  ‘Lord of the Manor!’ said Hilary. ‘A far cry from Paradise Lane.’

  Henry shook his head slowly, in disbelief, delight and just a little disquiet.

  It can take a long time to buy a house. It was September before they actually took possession and October before it was habitable.

  Henry and Hilary were very excited about showing the house to their very first visitors, Kate and Camilla. Guiseppe couldn’t join them; he had a family crisis in Italy. Darren was working, and Ben wouldn’t go anywhere without him.

  A little shudder ran through the four of them as the Jaguar turned left at a signpost marked ‘Grayling-under-Witchwood 2’. Soon, in the traditional manner of the English countryside, they came upon another turning, with a signpost that read ‘Grayling-under-Witchwood 3’, but eventually they did reach the village. Now there was total silence in the car.

  There was a tiny estate of neat, trim council houses, then a farm, some Georgian houses, a timbered cottage, a brief pastoral interlude, a large Victorian house, a row of modest Edwardian cottages, a large handsome Perpendicular church, and, just beyond the church, on the left, opposite the cricket ground, The Old Manor House. A mellow autumn sun was shining hazily, lighting up the honey in the stone.

  ‘It’s gorgeous,’ said Camilla.

  Kate said nothing at first. She was torn in two. She disliked the principle of buying second homes, but she loved her parents. The love won, as it always did in the end with Kate.

  ‘Yes, it is,’ she admitted. ‘Gorgeous.’

  They’d brought Friday evening’s meal with them ‘just this once, because we don’t know what’s available locally yet’, and they had a delightful dinner of roasted Mediterranean vegetables, and aubergine and potato curry, looking out on the quiet, gently rolling fields.

  ‘What a peaceful scene,’ said Camilla. ‘Sheep quietly grazing.’

  ‘I don’t want to cast a pall,’ said Henry, knowing that he was about to do just that, ‘but we saw them as lambs the day we first came here. They were gambolling in that field with all the joys of the privilege of existence. Look at them now. Listless and dull. Why? Because they’re thick? No! Because they realise just how tedious the existence they felt so privileged to have is for sheep. “We can do anything,” they cried as lambs. “All things are possible.” What do their adult grumbles say? “It’s bloody grass again for tea.” What an existence. Poor things. We really ought to be vegetarian. That meal was lovely tonight.’

  While Hilary made coffee, Camilla went upstairs to phone Guiseppe on her mobile. She was very punctilious about using her own phone to make her own phone calls, and it turned out that you could only get a signal on the upper floor at The Old Manor House.

  ‘A woman just drove through your garden at a rate of knots,’ she said on her return. ‘Woe betide any birds or small children that might be in the way.’

  ‘What sort of a woman?’ asked Henry.

  ‘That’s a stupid question, darling,’ said Hilary. ‘Camilla would hardly have seen her.’

  ‘I wasn’t expecting a novelist’s description, darling,’ said Henry. ‘ “A woman just drove through our garden, middle-aged, dark, with a slight air of mystery about her, leading Camilla to believe that she might have lived out East, and grown used to her own company, and lived on coconut curry and real turtle soup. Childless, probably, and yet there hung over her a curiously maternal air, as if … as if she wished she had been a mother.” ’

  ‘It’s lucky you abandoned your one attempt to write a novel all those years ago,’ said Hilary drily.

  ‘No, but the funny thing is, I’d say that’s exactly what she did look like,’ said Camilla, ‘and I’ll tell you this. She’s no oil painting.’

  In the morning, with fluffy clouds appearing in a clear sky like bubbles in a soup that’s being reheated, Henry drove out of the gateless exit to his garden, through the field of disillusioned sheep, and into the garden of the stone cottage.

  He drove round to the front, parked on the gravel, and got out of his car slowly, curiously reluctant to confront Mrs Scatchard, yet full of curiosity about her. He had agreed with Hilary that they didn’t want to fall out with the woman, they didn’t want to appear to be pompous berks from London, but on the other hand they had come here to have peace and quiet. They might get some chickens, they might have visitors with small children, their garden must be safe.

  Making the classic decision that is actually no decision, they had resolved to play it by ear.

  The door swung open, before he had knocked, to reveal a woman who was certainly no oil painting. In fact, Henry’s first dreadful thought was that Mrs Scatchard looked like Bradley Tompkins in drag.

  His second, far far more dreadful thought, was that it was Bradley Tompkins in drag.

  The colour drained from Bradley Tompkins’s rouged cheeks. His legs began to buckle
.

  ‘Oh my God,’ he said, as he crashed to the ground beside Henry.

  For a moment Henry thought that Bradley Tompkins had suffered a heart attack. His own heart began to race. He was a compassionate man, but he didn’t think he would be capable of parting Bradley’s over-reddened lips – he had no flair for make-up – and giving him the kiss of life. He felt for the man’s (?) pulse. He found it. Relief swept over him.

  Bradley Tompkins opened both eyes and shut them again rapidly as he saw that Henry was more than a bad dream. Then he opened one eye.

  ‘I think I should send for an ambulance,’ said Henry.

  ‘No!’ shrieked Bradley Tompkins. ‘No. I’m fine. I just … fainted … passed out … I’m fine. No problem. I can’t go to hospital, Henry, dressed like this. Although I suppose it doesn’t matter now. The game is up. Unless of course I agree to your demands.’

  ‘My demands?’

  ‘It is blackmail, I presume.’

  ‘What are you blathering about? Of course it isn’t blackmail. I had no idea you were here. Now how are you going to get up? I don’t know if I can lift you.’

  Bradley Tompkins managed to turn over on to his stomach, and scrambled to his hands and knees. With Henry’s help, he stood up. When Henry let go, he almost over-balanced, but recovered. He moved his legs and arms gingerly, feeling for breakages, but didn’t find any.

  Henry led him into the hall, which had a marble floor far too grand for its small size. There were glass cases containing stuffed animals. Bradley led the way into a small, dark, stuffy, dusty living room, decorated with sentimental Victorian paintings of babies and doggies. There were two, large, sagging armchairs and an exhausted settee.

  Bradley Tompkins collapsed into one of the armchairs.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m rather shaken.’

  ‘Have you any brandy?’ asked Henry.

  Bradley Tompkins pointed to a small drinks cabinet. Henry found the brandy, poured a small glass, and took a sip.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘I needed that.’

  Bradley gawped.

  ‘I thought you were getting it for me!’ he said.

  ‘I was,’ said Henry, ‘but I’ve always wanted to do that, and I couldn’t resist it.’

  He poured another glass, and handed it to Bradley, who was wearing a knee-length tweed skirt and a cream cotton top.

  They sat in the large armchairs at either side of the tiny hearth, in which there was a large bowl of dried flowers. Henry hated dried flowers.

  ‘What did you mean, you had no idea I was here?’ asked Bradley.

  ‘Just that. I was as amazed to see you as you were to see me.’

  ‘What are you doing here if not tailing me?’

  Henry had to admit that Bradley’s wig as a woman was far superior to his wig as a man.

  ‘I came in all innocence, to see Mrs Scatchard,’ he said. ‘I came to discuss a disputed right of way.’

  ‘Right of way?’

  ‘Through my garden.’

  ‘Oh no!’ shrieked Bradley Tompkins. ‘You haven’t bought The Old Manor House.’

  Henry nodded.

  ‘I’ve often wondered if there’s a God,’ said Bradley Tompkins. ‘Now I know there isn’t.’

  ‘How do you think I feel?’ said Henry. ‘I’ve spent a small fortune on a rural paradise, and I get you.’

  ‘There’s no need to be insulting.’

  Henry poured two more brandies. They both needed them.

  ‘Bradley, let me promise you something,’ said Henry. ‘I have no intention of blackmailing you. I promise you that neither Hilary nor I will ever tell anybody about … this.’

  ‘Why should I believe you?’

  ‘No reason. I imagine you’re going to be very worried indeed. But for some reason you choose to live this double life …’

  ‘Here it comes. The disapproval. The psycho-babble. The curiosity.’

  ‘Curiosity, yes. Of course I’m curious.’

  Bradley didn’t tell him anything straightaway, but they continued to talk, and they had another brandy, these two men who hated each other, and in an extraordinary way they found it companionable and even rather exciting to be drinking so much so early in the day, so that they had a fourth brandy, and, during the fourth brandy, Bradley opened his heart.

  ‘I don’t like Bradley Tompkins,’ he said. ‘I had a twin, Henry. She was … she was what they used to call a spastic. She died when we were six. I hardly remember her. I gave her the life she never had, Henry. I became her twin.’

  Henry was astounded. He knew that Bradley wasn’t making this up. He didn’t know what to say. He wanted Bradley to continue. Well, he knew that Bradley would have to continue. So, there was no need to say anything.

  ‘I don’t much like myself,’ continued Bradley.

  Henry resisted the temptation of saying that he wasn’t a bad judge.

  ‘I don’t much like myself and neither does anybody else. I suppose I’ve felt a great deal of guilt that I who was so unworthy of life survived and Grace – that was her name, Grace – who might have been so much more worthy of life – didn’t. I felt a growing need to have her around me. So … I re-created her. I gave her back some of the life she never had.

  ‘I gave her a husband. I felt she deserved a bit of fun. He had to have died, of course, or where was he? Also, it gave her a different name. I didn’t want her to be Miss Tompkins, having to tell everybody I was Bradley’s sister. I only mention it when the resemblance is commented on.

  ‘It works, Henry. It works in all sorts of ways. The human imagination is very powerful, and at times I become, I really do believe I do, I become my sister. At other times …’

  He trailed off. Henry poured a little more brandy. Bradley took a sip, and resumed.

  ‘This is very strange, Henry, and doesn’t make much sense to me. I … er … I’m not much good with women. Never have been.’ He gave a deep sigh. ‘Humiliating moments, Henry. Moments fate doesn’t allow me to forget. Failing to get it up with the gorgeous Sally Atkinson, who made things worse by sympathising. This is quite inappropriate, doesn’t make sense at all, but dressed as my sister, being my sister, I find I can get it up. I even have a relationship with a … a woman, or should I say, “another woman”? I have a true friend, and we have sex, and find just a little peace together. You’ll laugh …’

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘She’s a bisexual bicycle repairer from Bicester.’

  I could hardly say it, let alone fuck it, thought Henry.

  ‘Of course I won’t laugh. Good for you.’

  ‘I suppose I horrify you like this.’

  No, Grace, I actually much prefer you to Bradley.

  But Henry didn’t say this.

  ‘I fully accept you as you are,’ he said. ‘I will not interfere with your life one little bit. I can’t believe that fate has brought us together like this, but fate always was a mischievous little swine. I will leave you completely alone, Bradley. I won’t even make an issue of the right of way.’

  ‘You won’t need to. I wouldn’t be seen dead in your garden. Are you really telling the truth, Henry? This is just … serendipity? Far too nice a word for this ghastly situation.’

  ‘I am, Bradley. Hilary and I will never mention a word of this, even to our friends – and I will let you know, without fail, every time I’m coming to Grayling-under-Witchwood, so that you can avoid me if you wish.’

  Henry made the short journey home extremely carefully, because of the brandy, and with a heavy heart.

  The two men had talked properly for the first time. They had felt almost at ease with each other, over their brandies, and Bradley Tompkins had every reason to be grateful to Henry for not spilling the beans. However, Henry didn’t believe that the man would be grateful for his silence. He had seen him as Mrs Scatchard. He had seen up his legs to his scarlet knickers when he fainted. Bradley had told him that he couldn’t get it up. He had told him that he was having a re
lationship with a bisexual bicycle repairer from Bicester. He would never forgive Henry for knowing these things.

  Later, Henry would believe that the events of that particular, never to be forgotten Saturday morning, had tipped Bradley’s hatred over into a new, irrational, manic intensity which would stop at nothing and was truly to be feared.

  12 A Distinct Risk of Mercury Poisoning

  TOWARDS THE END of 2001, two jocular remarks upset Henry. One of them was made by his darling daughter Kate. They met in the middle of the afternoon for a late vegetarian lunch at Oat Cuisine in Kingly Street, sometimes said to be the best vegetarian restaurant in Kingly Street.

  ‘You’ll be in danger of mercury poisoning soon, if you’re not careful,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  Kate took a sip of organic wine and wiped her mouth with her Fair Trade napkin. The tables, walls and floors were made of pine from sustainable forests.

  The only pity of it was that the food was so uninspired.

  ‘It’s a line from a play we’re thinking of putting on,’ she said. ‘There’s a great risk of mercury poisoning if you spend a lot of time at crematoria. The burning releases the mercury from the fillings of the deceased.’

  ‘Your play sounds fun.’

  ‘Well it is a comedy. It’s part a modern black comedy and part a tribute to the old British comic tradition.’

  ‘What’s it called? “Carry On Up the Crem”?’

  Kate blushed.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, in a little girlish voice, a disappointed daughter’s voice. ‘Naff idea?’