The House Martin

by William Parker

‘Well sometime round just before lunch, I think. But sometimes that train can be a bit late, actually.’

  ‘Yes, that does seem to happen quite a bit, doesn’t it? Are you alright sitting here waiting? You’ve been here an awfully long time.’

  ‘Oh yes. In fact I’m just learning some of my history dates. She’ll be here in a minute, I expect.’

  He’s getting his music class ready. He teaches it in the front hall. It’s a special event. You have to be invited, and it means you finish prep early and stay up late, too. It’s one of my favourite things, because he plays us music, and then we answer questions about it. I’m always invited. I love it that he asks me more questions than practically anybody else. Once he played a tape of a man with a very deep singing voice, and I said that he sounded the same as someone who we once heard when we went to a concert in Gloucester Cathedral. Mr. England said he thought that I was a ‘very clever young man’ because in fact it was the same man! I think about that moment over and over again.

  He’s gone out again now to get more things for the class.

  I want to tell him that I must find out about Mummy. I must tell someone, and he’s the best one. He’ll be back in a minute. I’ll tell him as soon as he comes back. I’ll say that we need to find out about the times of the trains. I’ll say that sometimes, if you’re not quick enough, it’s difficult to get off that train at Chepstow. I’ll say that perhaps we should telephone the station to ask if there’s a lady stuck on the platform.

  He’s come back in with a long piece of wire with a plug on the end of it, and he’s bending down trying to arrange the electricity.

  ‘Mr. England…’

  ‘Yes, Benjamin?’

  ‘I am actually just wondering a little bit where my mother might be. She is quite late now, in fact.’

  ‘Yes, Ben. I’ve just had a word about it to Mr. Burston. He’s got it all in hand. Probably phoning Chepstow Station at this very minute.’

  So they know now. They know she’s not here. They know I’ve been waiting all this time. They’ll be talking about me, and they’ll be talking about Mummy. Miss Carson will be nodding her head at Mrs. Burston as if she can’t believe there’s trouble with Teasdale’s mother again. They’ll all be talking about how long I’ve been silently waiting in the hall for her, and they’re going to be feeling sorry for me. I hate that.

  Mummy’s coming because it’s one of her bad days, and that’s very worrying. It means she could be terribly late, or get lost, or worst of all, hurt herself. If she’s not on the train perhaps she’s coming in a car with somebody else, like Caroline Dawson. She lives up by the golf club and is one of Mummy’s old friends but likes a drink the same as Mummy does. If they’re coming in her car they’ll have an accident, because Caroline Dawson drives very badly. When she’s leaving our house in the afternoon, she gets in her red sports car and revs up the engine till it’s about to burst, and then she drives off right in the middle of the road with a lot of smoke coming out of the back. Perhaps Mummy’s having a day out with those people from home, and when they open the front door Trotsky John will be swearing, Anna Maria will have a bottle with a napkin round it in her hand, and Caroline Dawson will be wearing her big scarf skew-whiff on her head and her bright red lipstick smudged all round her mouth.

  I’m sure that my dad doesn’t know, otherwise he would have been the one to phone to say that Mummy was coming. He might be abroad at the moment, and that would explain a lot, because when he’s away, she’s much more likely to be bad. When Mummy’s had too much sherry at home my dad doesn’t always seem to notice, or perhaps he pretends not to. I always know, though. But if she’s had so much that she can’t make the dinner, or she’s in bed when he comes home, or she’s wobbling a lot in the kitchen and not talking clearly with the radio on too loud, they might have a furious argument before he goes to his study. The thing is, he only shouts at her if she’s really bad, and if she’s just quite bad, he doesn’t say anything. Mummy tries ever so hard to be a bit better if my dad’s at home.

  I never ever talk to him about it, and he doesn’t talk to me about it. I wouldn’t know what to say, and I’m certain he doesn’t want me ever to mention it. It’s a very strict rule in our house.

  Mr. England’s setting up his tape machine, and it’s making squiggly backward noises while he’s trying to find the beginning of the music. There’s a loose bit of the tape poking out of the middle of the reel which is whizzing around, and it’s hitting against the side of the machine making a clicking noise like a mad clock. Mr. England’s trying hard to get it ready. I don’t think it’s the right time to interrupt him, but I want to tell him about my dad not knowing.

  ‘Sir…? I wait for a little while. He doesn’t say anything, and I think he didn’t hear me.

  ‘Sir…? I say it again and look at his face. He’s biting his lip because he’s concentrating so hard trying to find the right place to stop the tape, and then he says, ‘Yes, Ben?’ without looking at me.

  ‘Actually, Sir… I think perhaps we should phone up my father. I think that probably it’s best if he knows I’m waiting, because…because…’

  ‘Because what, Ben?’

  And then suddenly I’m talking so fast I can hardly keep up with myself.

  ‘…because sometimes my mum isn’t so well, and she does things that my dad doesn’t always know about, and it could be that perhaps this is one of those times. I’m really not sure that he knows she’s coming today, because he might be on one of his abroad trips and that means we couldn’t talk to him anyway—and if Mummy’s really bad today, I don’t want to go out with her; I really don’t. I just want it that we try and speak to him in his office in London to tell him, please, and—and actually I think it’s best if I don’t go out with her if possible…’

  ‘Hold on, hold on. Calm down, Ben, it’s all going to be alright. Listen, we’ve already thought of that, and the Headmaster has spoken to a nice lady at your father’s office to let him know that your mother’s been delayed, alright? He’s out at a meeting at the moment, but he’ll be phoning us back when he returns. I’m absolutely sure he knows exactly what’s going on, though. Now just take a couple of deep breaths and try to relax.’ Mr. England smiles at me, and I realise that my face must be red, and I’m clenching my hands, and my chest feels funny. Now he knows I’m upset. I hate that very much. But at the same time, I’m a bit relieved I’ve said it.

  ‘Now—I’m going to fetch you a glass of water, and if you’re still here in ten minutes or so, I think we ought to arrange a bite to eat for you. Do you think you need your inhaler? Do you know where it is?’

  ‘I’m alright thank you, Sir. I know where it is, but I don’t really need it.’

  He goes out and comes back very quickly with water in one of those glasses from the dining room which the seniors have a joke about because it says ‘Duralex’ on the bottom. I take it from him with both hands and have a sip.

  ‘Better now?’

  ‘Yes, thank you, Sir.’ It feels as though the water must be medicine or something, because I do feel a bit better and calmer now.

  ‘I’m going into class now, Ben, but I’ll pop out and see if you’re still here in ten minutes or so, okay?’

  ‘Thank you Mr. England, I’ll be alright now. I’m sure she’s going to be here any second, actually.’

  Q

  The storm started on the same day Granny crashed her car. It was the Sunday of the first exeat of this term. Mr. Burston felt sorry for me, and secretly asked Alex Harman’s mother and father if they would mind taking me out for the day. Probably he told them that I was disappointed and upset, though I made sure he hadn’t seen that I was nearly crying when he told me in the study. Mr. Harman and Mr. Burston are old friends from University, and they were doing him a big favour by taking me with them.

  I was sitting on the bench by the practise nets by myself after we
’d all come back from church. I’d just been told about Granny not coming, and most of the boys had already gone. When I wasn’t upset anymore, I was thinking that I liked the loneliness of it and was just beginning to plan what I might do all by myself for the day. Last time I was alone for a Sunday exeat, Miss Carson went out for lunch and let me watch the telly all afternoon in surgery. She left a Cornish pasty and a piece of lemon tart for my lunch from her own private fridge. I fetched my slippers from under my bed and watched a film with Bette Davis in it where she went away on a holiday ugly and came back a few months later beautiful. I’d had a lovely time all by myself, but just when I was thinking that it might happen again, Miss Carson came and sat on the bench next to me and said that Harman’s parents were wondering whether I’d like to go out with them for the day.

  I didn’t want to go at all, because Harman isn’t a friend of mine—in fact he’s still a nip and that would make me look a bit of a spastic, really. But I could see from Miss Carson’s face that I was meant to be awfully excited about it and it would be very rude to say no, so I said, ‘that would be terribly nice,’ in a surprised way and then made an expression as though I was dead pleased.

  They were waiting in the hall for me. Everyone else had gone by then, and the whole school was really quiet. Usually you can hear at least something going on in the background, like cricket practise or tennis being played, or the lawn being mowed, or that fat Mrs. Ridgeley the cook dropping some pans in the kitchen, and the cleaning ladies chatting while they’re mopping around—even teachers shouting in one of the classrooms. It was quiet enough to hear nothing except the big old clock, as though it was the loudest thing in all the world. I was walking along the corridor in a hurry because of knowing that the Harmans were waiting for me, trying to get my arms into my too small blazer, and holding my boater and wishing I wasn’t going out. In the silence I could hear Harman talking to his mother.

  ‘But Mummy—I don’t want Teasdale to come with us—please…’ He sounded as though he might start to cry at any moment, and I wondered what I should do.

  ‘Now be nice, Bo-Bo. His Granny’s just had an accident in her car, and he’s very upset. Just think about how horrid it must be for him at the moment.’

  ‘I don’t care, and I just don’t want him to come. I don’t like him. I don’t like him at all. I just want to be with you and Daddy. Please, please…’

  ‘No, Bo-Bo—we’ve asked him and he’s coming, and I want you to be nice to him.’

  I thought it best to pretend that I’d not heard anything, and when I saw Mr. and Mrs. Harman I put out my hand and said, ‘Hello. I’m Benjamin. Thank you ever so much for inviting me out.’

  ‘Hello, there,’ Mrs. Harman said, ‘Lovely to have you with us—we’re going to Speech House in the forest for lunch, and then we thought we might go on to Symond’s Yat for a walk. I’m so sorry about your bad news, Ben, but Mr. Burston’s told us your grandmother’s not at all hurt, so no need to worry too much…’ Mr. Harman had a pipe in his mouth and tapped me on the head with a rolled up paper as he was opening the front door for us all to go out.

  Speech House is a posh hotel in the middle of the Forest of Dean, and we had roast beef and Yorkshire pudding in a very old dining room with walls made of dark wooden panels. The people who lived in the forest in the olden days used to go there for meetings, and once, Judge Jeffreys, who we’ve learned about in history, came and sentenced hundreds of people to be hanged for rebelling against the king. There was a picture of him on the wall, and another one of King Charles II who once went there for his lunch too. Alex Harman didn’t speak to me all day. When we were in his dad’s car, which was a Rolls Royce and should have been a bit of an adventure, he just folded his arms and made his lips all big with sulking and stared out of the window. After the roast beef, we had some scrunched up fruit in a jelly called ‘summer pudding’, and then Alex stopped talking even to his mother. In the end, she got up from the table, took him by the wrist out of the big door that went into the garden, and shouted at him.

  ‘I’m not putting up with this behaviour, Bo-Bo. Benjamin’s a charming boy with lovely manners. I don’t think you realise what it must be like to have a mother who’s not very well. You’re behaving atrociously. I’ve had enough, I really have…’

  ‘But I told you I didn’t want him to come,’ he shouted back, ‘and the whole day’s been ruined by it. And stop calling me Bo-Bo when he can hear it…’ Mr. Harman who’d not being talking very much and was mostly smoking his pipe and reading his paper all day looked over at me across the table and said ‘Sorry about that, old chap.’

  I didn’t blame Harman very much really. Who wants to go out for the day with someone from school when you just want to forget about it all for the day? Actually, I don’t blame him for not liking me, because I’ve never been especially nice to him. He’s got a lisp, and quite often I’ve joined in the teasing of him about it.

  It had been really hot all day, sunny at first and then a sort of mist in the sky that meant you could look straight at the sun without hurting your eyes and see it was twice as big as usual. It was funny having roast beef when it was such a hot day, but Mrs. Harman said Speech House was famous for it. After we were finished, we went to Symond’s Yat which is a beautiful high up place overlooking the river. Mr. Harman wanted to read his paper and sat on a bench with Alex. Mrs. Harman was trying her very best to be extra polite to me to make up for Alex’s bad behaviour, so we went for a walk and left them behind which was the best part of the day because she’s quite a nice lady actually. Then, when we were having tea and scones and meringues at a café in Monmouth full of old ladies with hats on, Mr. Harman looked at his watch and said, ‘What time are we meant to be getting these young gentlemen back to school?’ Mrs. Harman answered ‘Five-thirty,’ and Mr. Harman said, ‘Best get moving then,’ and Mrs. Harman said ‘Doesn’t time fly?’ with a big relieved smile on her face. We got back to school earlier than anybody else. I was ever so glad. I sat all by myself on the bench by the nets again waiting for everyone to get back wishing I’d been there all day.

  The sky was a pinky grey colour by then, and the big sun had completely gone. The air was thick and hot and damp. Mrs. Burston sat on the balcony with baby Mark on her lap, fanning herself with the Sunday paper. She kept making a funny noise with her mouth trying to blow some sticky hair from her forehead. Mr. Burston came out with no jacket on and his shirt sleeves rolled up, which I’ve never seen before. He looked at the sky with his hands on his hips and said, ‘It’s going to be a big one when it arrives.’

  On the other side of the river I could just make out ghostly trees with dogs barking underneath them. There were people on horses. The fogginess made them look as though they were in a black and white film except for their tops, half of them scarlet and half of them orange, shining through the distance. They were galloping around holding long sticks, and you could hear the sound of echoey clunking when they hit the ball on the ground, though you couldn’t see it. It’s a game called polio, I think.

  There was no wind that day. Absolutely none, which just isn’t normal for Saxham-on-Severn. Even the rooks in the big tree were silent for once. I thought I was going to have an asthma attack, which is something that I only have at home. Then I thought that it was just that there was no air to breathe, and everyone was probably feeling the same. I even started thinking nice things about the school swimming pool, which I hate because it’s an indoor one with not the slightest little bit of heating. It’s freezing even on the hottest day.

  It was getting hotter and hotter although it was nearly evening and time for bed. When the other boys started to come back I saw that a lot of the fathers weren’t wearing their jackets and had big wet patches under their arms. I heard Mrs. Theodorakis say ‘Don’t you find it unbelievably close?’ to Mrs. Burston, who said ‘Like being in a warm bath, isn’t it?’

  That night, when Miss Carson turned
out the lights in the dorm, it went quite dark even though the curtains weren’t drawn. We’d opened all the windows as wide as we could on account of it being so hot and uncomfortable and then, when Pugh took the blankets off his bed, we all copied him. The night was turning into a little bit of an adventure with no one being able to settle down and go to sleep—except for Lucky Lorrimer, of course. He was asleep straightaway. Lots of whispering started that turned to chatting which Pugh didn’t try to stop, not even when Nick Earl, without asking my permission, stood on my bed with his grubby feet on my pillow so he could look out of the window.

  ‘Very, very strange for late May, this…’ he said, ‘… to be this hot. Quite extraordinary. Unusual.’

  Miss Carson came in while he was still looking out and talking loudly about what he thought was going to happen. She told him to get back into bed and asked us all to settle down. But she wasn’t using a cross voice at all, which made it feel that all the rules were being relaxed, just the same as when it’s the last night of term. Everyone was excited—even Miss Carson. She got on my bed to look out of the window next to Earl, who hadn’t gone back to his bed even after being told. Next, Theo came over and climbed on too. They were looking so hard that I decided that I needed to see out as well, and so I got up and squeezed in beside Theo. No one said anything for a while. It was so peculiar—the gloomy darkness, the scary silence and the stuffy heat. Suddenly, she clapped her hands together, which made me jump. ‘Okay everyone. Back to bed. Just a storm brewing that’ll pass over you all in the middle of the night. Come on—chop, chop.’

  ‘Careful of that open window, Teasdale,’ Henry Pugh said to me quite quietly after she’d gone out, ‘If it pours in the middle of the night, your bed’s going to be even wetter than it usually is.’ I looked across at Tom Whickham, but I don’t think he heard.

  The flashes were lighting up the whole dormitory when Miss Carson came in and woke me for my wee. While I was kneeling down doing it, she moved around closing the windows and drawing the curtains. For a tiny moment every now and again, I could see her, bright as anything—but stuck as though she was in a photograph. Then there was blackness again, apart from her little torch, and a few seconds later she would be lit up again, but now stuck in a different place. The chamber pot was flashing a brilliant white, and my pee was frozen in space as though I might be doing it for the rest of my life, waiting for a spell to be broken in a fairytale.