‘It’s a death trap, that place,’ Dad said once after we visited. ‘One dropped match and that lot’d go up like a bonfire.’
‘It’s too damp for that,’ Mum snorted. ‘Did you see the mould on the walls?’
Great Uncle Albert looked like a city gent who’d fallen into a pile of coal dust and carried on without stopping to wash himself. The suit he wore was constantly thick, dark and shiny.
‘Great Uncle Albert’s very old and frail,’ Mum always said, but this made him sound weak and to me he was the opposite – fascinatingly different – a true eccentric. He talked about his dead brothers and sisters as if they were still alive, and confused all our names. We hadn’t visited him for years and, since he never wrote or phoned (‘a waste of good money’), we didn’t know he had died until the solicitor’s letter arrived.
‘“Estate” means everything he owned,’ Dad was explaining.
‘Dear old Albert,’ said Mum affectionately.
‘How old was he?’ I asked.
Mum tried to calculate. ‘Let’s see. He was Granny’s older brother. She was seventy-seven when she died and that was when you were still in a buggy, so that’s …’
She gave up. ‘Oh, about ninety.’
‘Not bad, considering he still rode his bicycle until last year,’ said Dad admiringly.
‘He used to say “I’m ready to go any time”,’ Mum recalled, looking weepy.
‘The ones who say that always last the longest,’ said Dad.
‘But I never thought he’d leave me everything – dear Albert!’ said Mum.
‘How much?’ asked Ian, entering the kitchen. The drums had been silent for some time, he had obviously overheard the news.
‘Thousands – when we’ve sold the house.’
I let out a whoop of delight, then picked Mum up and twirled her round. Ian was chanting, ‘It could be you!’
Just then Helen entered the kitchen with the BMW driver trailing behind her. ‘This is Harry,’ she said.
‘Nice to meet ya, Harry!’ said Ian, slapping him on the back. Though he was a strange-looking bloke, we were in the mood to welcome anyone.
I put Mum down. ‘What’s going on?’ asked Helen. ‘Have we won the lottery?’
‘As good as. Great Uncle Albert’s dead!’ Ian replied.
Very carefully, Harry said, ‘Presumably he was not a favourite uncle.’
That changed the mood.
‘Quite,’ said Dad, casting a sheepish look at Mum. ‘Wonderful old gentleman, Albert,’ he said. ‘Er, sorry, Barry.’
‘Harry,’ corrected Helen.
‘Sorry, Harry. What must you think of us? May we offer you a cup of tea?’
Mum and Dad were moving into Formal Hospitality Mode, which was odd: they didn’t usually do this for Helen’s boyfriends, but then Helen’s boyfriends weren’t usually middle-aged men.
When Helen objected to Harry being given a mug and went in search of the best china, Ian and I escaped upstairs.
‘Who’s he to tell us how we should feel about Albert?’ Ian asked resentfully. We’d both liked Great Uncle Albert. He’d never spoken to us in a special voice for children. He barked at us just as he barked at everyone else. He would whack me over the head with a rolled-up newspaper. I always recognised this as a sign of friendship. On one visit he gave me a Davy pit helmet – a real one that miners wore to go down into the coal pit. I wondered whether he’d been a coal miner but when I asked Mum she said he’d worked for the Co-op all his life.
I was sorry Great Uncle Albert was dead. Alive he would never have moved to Elm Close, to Dublin, or anywhere else. In fact, he’d refused Mum’s invitation to come and live with us, much to Dad’s relief. Albert wouldn’t have left those mysterious piles of belongings, but now he was separated from them forever.
‘Miserable git,’ I said, and I didn’t mean Albert.
CHAPTER FIVE
Plans are Drawn Up
Ian came into the kitchen with another catalogue full of pictures of drum kits.
‘Mum, take a look at this! It’s the best on the market!’
Mum flung off her rubber gloves in exasperation. ‘Ian, how many times do I have to explain this? We haven’t any more money yet. We have to sell Uncle Albert’s house first, and before we do that we’ll have to clear out the contents. That will be a nightmare! Uncle Albert hasn’t thrown anything out since war was declared in 1939.’
‘Why was he like that?’ I asked. ‘Why did he hoard everything?’
Mum considered for a moment. ‘Well, he was brought up in the days of real poverty. He would have been lucky to share a pair of shoes with one of his brothers or sisters. People didn’t have the number of possessions we take for granted nowadays. They kept things carefully. Albert never lost the habit.’
‘Much better for the environment – a careful use of resources,’ said Helen, who was measuring out a diet portion of muesli. This from a person who’d cut down the Rain Forests if it would result in a new shade of lipstick.
She opened a glossy magazine. ‘Mum, can I have a Paul Costello suit? Harry says it’s understated quality.’
‘Harry says,’ repeated Mum bitterly, then added, under her breath, ‘How often must I hear those words?’
‘Harry is a professional image consultant,’ Helen reminded us. ‘He should know.’
‘Yes, dear,’ replied Mum, unconvinced. ‘Now, back to the real world, who wants to help with stage one: clearing out Uncle Albert’s house?’
‘It’s a long way,’ objected Ian.
Mum nodded. ‘It’ll take three days. One day to get there, one to do the clearing out, and a day to travel back.’
‘Can’t,’ said Helen emphatically. I’ve got a special date–’
‘–with the suit!’ I finished for her.
‘I haven’t even decided when we’re going yet,’ Mum pointed out.
‘Well, I’m bound to be busy. We’re doing electrolysis next week,’ said Helen.
‘What’s that?’ I asked. It sounded like electrocution.
‘Pulling hairs off people,’ Mum explained.
‘Have you been practising on Harry?’ I asked. He was nearly bald, though the bit of hair that did grow was pulled back into a ponytail.
‘Can we fly over?’ interrupted Ian. I could tell he was searching for a way out too.
‘No, of course we can’t,’ Dad chipped in. ‘We’ll probably want to bring lots of things back with us, so it’s got to be the ferry.’
‘So you’re going too, Dad?’ Helen asked hopefully.
‘Yes,’ Dad answered. ‘I’m going to contact the estate agents and put the house on the market.’
‘I’d definitely help if it was just a day but the pressure’s really building up for the Leaving Cert,’ whined Ian.
Mum and Dad looked impressed. Study was usually the last thing Ian worried about. But they missed the look he and Helen had given each other. As kids when Helen and Ian were forced to let me join in their games, that was the look they gave each other after they’d found a way of leaving me behind. Once, when I was six, they left me in the cupboard under the stairs for hours under the impression that we were playing ‘Hide and Seek’.
I guessed that they wanted the house free of Mum, Dad or me. To test my suspicion, I said, ‘Yeah, I’ll help.’
I was right, Ian and Helen beamed at each other.
‘Good lad!’ Dad said, stretching over the breakfast clutter to pat me on the back.
‘Wonderful!’ Mum agreed. They were overdoing the praise a bit to annoy Ian and Helen.
‘Yeah, wonderful!’ drawled Ian. ‘Brute strength’s what’s needed for this job. Let’s face it, if brains were potatoes, David wouldn’t have enough for a bag of chips!’
I heard Helen giggling at this as they left the room together.
Mum planned the trip to Waltham Abbey like an SAS Officer on a mission. Soon she’d fixed the dates (a week ahead in my mid-term break), booked the ferry to and from Holyhea
d and begun planning what we should take with us.
My list included: walkman, packets of biscuits, cans of Coke, bars of chocolate and a copy of Great Moments in Rugby. Mum’s included vacuum cleaner, step ladder and black refuse bags. All Dad could think of was sleeping bags.
‘Sleeping bags? What’s wrong with the beds?’ I asked.
An unfortunate question. Mum started to describe the beds in Great Uncle Albert’s terraced house. Dust mites, bed bugs, creeping dermatitis. All in all, sleeping in one of those old beds seemed to be a slow way of committing suicide.
‘Why don’t we stay in a hotel?’ I asked.
‘Take too long, cost too much,’ Dad explained. ‘Don’t worry,’ he assured me, ‘we’ll go out for meals, but we’ll just camp down on the floor.’
‘In the sitting-room?’
‘If you like.’
‘Okay.’ The sailing ship would be in view. I’d be in my sleeping bag and be able to imagine the sailors in their hammocks.
At least I’d get good food – no weevils in ship’s biscuits for me.
CHAPTER SIX
The Journey
A week later, we were on our way. As we slowed down outside Birmingham Mum and Dad got nostalgic.
‘Look at this traffic!’ exclaimed Dad. ‘Do you remember when it took us only six hours to reach Uncle Albert’s house?’
‘When Helen and Ian were little! When Ian was still in a car-seat,’ reminisced Mum.
They launched into the cute things Helen and Ian had done and said when they were young. ‘Ian’s first word was tractor,’ Mum recalled. ‘Only he used to say “twactor”. Remember?’
Dad repeated ‘twactor’ and chuckled.
‘We’d spend the whole journey counting twactors,’ Mum laughed.
Sad, isn’t it? One thing you can be sure about everyone is that they’ve been young in the past, so why parents get so worked up about it is a mystery. These conversations about ‘the good old days’ made me uneasy. They showed how Mum and Dad yearned for a simpler time when their kids were little and easy to control. Little kids: little problems; big kids: big problems.
‘I bet Ian isn’t counting twactors now!’ I said grimly. I had a rough idea what he might be doing. I’d seen him heaving a crate of stout up the stairs the evening before we’d left. More mysteriously, Helen was browsing through cookery books. But I said nothing. I didn’t want Dad to turn the car round. I wanted to see Great Uncle Albert’s house again.
The traffic crawled through Waltham Cross, but I didn’t mind. I liked looking at the stone cross that stands in the middle of the junction. Dad told me the cross was built on the orders of an English king. It marked the place where the coffin of his dead wife had rested overnight on the journey south to bury her. That was centuries ago. But here was the cross, still jamming up the traffic – except now the jam was caused by cars – machines that the king couldn’t have imagined. But he’d found a way to make sure his wife wasn’t forgotten. Great Uncle Albert had lived and died just a few miles away, but who knew or cared? Who would remember him in a hundred years time?
I resolved to find something of Great Uncle Albert’s to keep. ‘You shouldn’t live and die forgotten,’ I said to myself, then realised, as Mum and Dad looked back at me with surprise, that I’d spoken aloud.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Ship
The car drew up outside Great Uncle Albert’s house. Dad deposited Mum and myself on the pavement and drove off to explore the estate agents and restaurants.
We stood outside the house, and Mum sighed. ‘I remember coming here as a child … This’ll be the last time.’
Small though the houses were, they looked out on a river which gave an almost rural impression to the surroundings. It looked like ‘Coronation Street’ with a bit more grass and water.
‘Cliff Richard used to live in this road,’ Mum told me.
‘Who?’
‘Cliff Richard! You know, “We’re All Going on a Summer Holiday”.’ She actually began to sing!
‘Yes, yes, I know,’ I said hastily, looking around to make sure that no-one had heard.
‘He was very kind to the old people,’ Mum went on. ‘And the Shadows lived around here too. I once went to a wedding where they were guests.’
‘Great,’ I said, dismissively. If nostalgia was a hereditary condition then I was in big trouble. I headed towards the house. ‘Where do we start?’
Mum pulled herself together.
‘Ruthlessness is the key,’ she told me. ‘If in doubt, throw it out. Look!’ A large yellow skip stood in Great Uncle Albert’s front garden. In fact, it nearly filled the whole plot.
‘I’ve booked that for two days,’ said Mum. ‘I expect to fill it.’
I nodded. I was beginning to realise that this was more a mission of destruction than exploration.
Mum pulled out the bulky keys that Higgins & Stop had sent her and placed a key in the lock. She pushed and pulled on the door. The lock was effective but the door looked as if it would come off its hinges at the slightest shove.
Mum turned to me, ‘It’s difficult to believe Uncle Albert isn’t here to let us in.’ That was all that it took for me to visualise him in the hallway, heading towards the door. He had an eccentric way of saying hello. The front door would open but he’d already be disappearing into the kitchen. ‘Kettle’s on,’ he’d say over his shoulder. That was the greeting we’d get for travelling across the Irish Sea and two hundred miles to see him. How he knew it was us at the door I never understood. Perhaps he peered out of the window first, or maybe he had so few visitors that he knew it wasn’t anyone else. Perhaps everyone got the kettle’s-on treatment.
When the door creaked opened and we entered the narrow hallway I sensed that Mum wished for that greeting too.
The same musty smell, the same brown wallpaper, heaps of belongings, but no Uncle Albert.
I went into what he had called the ‘scullery’. There was his stove and the famous kettle, dull grey and cold.
Mum had followed me in and was staring around at the familiar objects.
‘Let’s have a look around before we start,’ I suggested.
Mum didn’t reply so I wandered into the sitting-room. There, still, were the bundles of newspapers tied with string, and the familiar furniture – every surface covered with objects to stock a Car Boot sale.
My eyes turned to the mantelpiece. Still there! – the sailing ship made of thousands of strands of delicate glass, woven into shape in clear red, white and blue. When I had first seen it, the ship was bigger than me, and I’d stared up at it on the giant mantelpiece. Ever since, I’d missed no opportunity to steal into the room and gaze at it, until at last I was tall enough to examine it at eye level. Now I could touch it.
There were tiny glass sailors climbing up the ship’s rigging. Their uniforms were moulded perfectly, even to the detail of navy ribbons round their caps.
Pushing my way through the stacks of magazines that were piled in front of the fireplace, I reached over and tried to lift the ship down. It wouldn’t move. ‘It’s stuck!’
Mum came in. ‘Yes, he often did that.’
‘You mean he glued things down?’
‘Yes, so no-one could steal them.’
I gripped the dome and lifted it off. It was covered in dust, like everything else in the house. But inside, the intricate glass ship was perfectly clean, the glass was so fine it was like lace, yet it was a real sailing ship to me. All my life I’d pictured it buffeted by winds on the high seas in the time of pirates and buccaneers. Mum thought it was something to do with the Crystal Palace Exhibition. Now I’d never be able to ask Great Uncle Albert about it. Like most of our family history on Mum’s side, the English side, it was lost …
Then my dream turned into a nightmare. Perhaps I knocked the ship when I removed the dome, but as I looked at the glass ship, it began to crumble. First the rigging collapsed, then the sails. One after another the fine strands fell until ther
e was no more than a pile of red, white and blue glass chips.
I gasped in horror.
Mum looked up from the pile of newspapers she was inspecting. ‘Okay?’ she asked.
What could I say? A dream had fallen to pieces before my eyes.
‘The ship,’ I said inadequately
‘David! How did you do that?’
‘It just happened.’
Mum groaned. ‘You must be more careful,’ she said, because she always said that if I was within a hundred metres of something that broke, not because she cared about the ship.
‘It was old age,’ I said. ‘It just crumbled.’
Mum sighed. ‘It happens to people too. Clear up the bits.’
I swept up the pieces and threw them on the skip.
Dad returned an hour or so later. Most of the estate agents were shut, so he was going to have to try again the next day. Clearing out was going to be left to Mum and me.
Dad had found somewhere to eat though. There was a steak restaurant just a mile away. When we returned to the house having eaten, we were so tired that we just took our sleeping bags, cleared spaces on the floor and slept.
No ghost of Uncle Albert kept us awake. Wherever he was he wasn’t in the house, but I went to sleep wondering if dead people weren’t just the sum of their possessions.
CHAPTER EIGHT
My Nasty Neighbours Page 2