by Joan Smith
Peggy’s response was not encouraging.
‘Yeah,’ she said, absently fingering one of her earrings. ‘London, sort of.’
Loretta noticed a band of white skin on the third finger of the girl’s left hand, as though she had worn a ring until very recently.
‘Are you staying at the peace camp for long? Or did you come for the weekend?’
‘Depends.’ She was apparently bent on keeping her replies to the minimum consistent with good manners.
Before Loretta could try another gambit, Clara finished a conversation with Here and swept down on them.
‘Now, Peggy, what can I get you to drink? Some wine perhaps, or a gin and tonic? I know, why not have a kir, that’s just the thing for a spring evening. Oh dear, you don’t seem to have anything either, Loretta – Imo, what were you thinking of, darling? Loretta hasn’t got a drink. Right, that’s two kirs.’
Loretta opened her mouth. She had been quite unable to face the latter drink since it had featured in a highly emotional scene in Paris the previous year when she had parted from a lover in distressing circumstances. Beside her, Peggy was looking blank, and Loretta realized the girl had no idea what a kir was. Clara, it was becoming clear, was not the most sensitive of women. She was about to make a polite protest on both their behalfs when Clara clapped a hand to her forehead.
‘Heaven, what am I thinking of? Here’s poor Peggy with a bang on the head and I’m offering her alcohol! Tell you what, Peggy, I’ll get you a nice glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. And a kir for Loretta. Anyone else? No? Right.’
She swept from the room; Peggy, sensing Loretta’s dismay, thawed a little.
‘Bossy, i’n’t she?’ she said in a low voice, raising her eyebrows theatrically. ‘Bet she’s used to getting her own way.’
They exchanged complicit smiles and then Loretta, feeling slightly guilty about this disloyalty to her hostess, turned back to Here and asked which papers he worked for. He was explaining that his main source of income was specialist magazines when Clara came back with the drinks. Handing them over – Loretta took hers with a shiver – Clara pulled up a chair and joined them, settling her dress in vivid folds about her feet.
‘Now, Clara, do tell us what happened at this settlement of yours last night,’ said Gilbert.
He meant the peace camp, Loretta guessed, although she had never heard it described in this way before. It occurred to her, correctly as it turned out, that Gilbert Brown was not an admirer of the peace women.
‘Well, Gilbert, I’m afraid some of our neighbours decided to take the law into their own hands,’ Clara said combatively. ‘And it’s a miracle no one was killed. Burning branches, that’s what they used – they very nearly set fire to the caravan with two people inside it. They wore masks, of course, that shows how brave they are. Even so, we all know who’s behind it, don’t we? It’s RALF again.’
‘Oh, come on, Clara, you’ve got no proof–’
Loretta interrupted Gilbert. ‘Who’s Ralph? If you know who he is, why–’
‘No, no, RALF’s not a person,’ Clara explained impatiently. ‘It’s a what d’you call those things made of initials, an acronym. Residents Against Loony Feminists, that’s what it stands for.’
‘Females, not feminists,’ put in Imo. ‘Those people wouldn’t know how to spell feminists.’
‘It’s not called that any more, as you’re perfectly well aware,’ Gilbert protested. ‘It was changed at the second meeting. It’s the Flitwell Residents’ Association.’
‘Whatever it’s called, they ought to be ashamed of themselves,’ Clara said hotly. They’re nothing more than a bunch of vigilantes. It was them who got the camp evicted from the main gate,’ she told Loretta ungrammatically, ‘and now they’re furious because it’s on my land. And staying there,’ she added.
‘Clara, I’m sure you haven’t got a shred of evidence,’ Gilbert objected. The association’s just a group of local people who support the base and don’t like it being disrupted by a bunch of agitators from outside the area. It’s got some very respectable members’ – he seemed to be addressing Loretta now – ‘like James Silbey, he’s an economist, very highly respected, he lives in the Old Rectory. And there’s Colin Kendall-Cole, he’s our MP. You’ve known Colin for years, Clara, you know he wouldn’t touch the association if there was the merest hint of violence ... For all you know, it was just a group of local lads who’d had a bit too much to drink in the Green Man. And to be frank, if those women insist on staying here and making a fuss, they’re going to have to expect a backlash. After all, we’ve lived with the base for years, since the last war in fact, and we know the Americans are here for our protection as much as theirs.’
‘Now wait a minute –’ Here began to speak but was interrupted.
‘The trouble with you, Clara,’ Gilbert pressed on, ‘is you’ve suddenly changed your tune and you want everyone else to do the same. The worst bigots are always the ones who’ve just seen the light. You were quite happy to live next door to the base until last month.’
‘Exactly.’ Clara pounced. ‘And what happened last month? These so-called allies of ours, these people who are here to defend democracy, they suddenly took off and bombed a country we’re not even at war with! Didn’t you see the pictures on the news, all those women and children in hospital in Tripoli? It was planes from here, from Dunstow, that did that!’
‘Maybe it was a mistake,’ Gilbert conceded in the most reasonable of tones. ‘But we’re talking with hindsight. And it doesn’t change the essential point – that the Americans are here to defend us from the Russians.’
‘The Russians.’ Peggy joined in unexpectedly. ‘I’m sick of hearing about the Russians. You people’ – she looked accusingly at Gilbert – ‘you people always dress it up in long words, but what it’s about is our kids. Is there gonna be a world for them to grow up in, or are we supposed to sit here and watch it get blown apart? Those blokes over there’ – she gestured, presumably in the direction of the base – ‘if they can bomb one place we’re not at war with, they can bomb another. I don’t want my kid to die ‘cause the Americans decide to attack Russia. They’re welcome to their atom bombs and their missiles – if they like them so much why don’t they keep them in America? Sorry,’ she said suddenly, casting an embarrassed look at Here as though she had just remembered his accent. ‘I didn’t mean anything personal.’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Here. ‘I used to be in the US navy, but as it happens I agree with you. In fact–’
At this moment the door opened and the last guest appeared. Loretta’s first thought, apart from her regret that the discussion had been interrupted at so interesting a point, was that Robert had, like her, changed for dinner; he was wearing a baggy grey suit and a very cheerful tie. It was a much more fashionable outfit than she’d expected of him.
‘Dear Robert, last as usual!’ Clara was on her feet; Robert crossed the room to kiss her cheek.
‘All in the cause of world peace,’ he said innocently, stepping back and looking for a vacant seat.
‘Peace?’ Clara sat down, a perplexed look on her face.
‘Why yes. I loaned my car to Imo in the service of the peace camp. So I had to wait for the storm to pass before I could walk over.’
His gentle irony seemed to pass over Clara’s head. ‘Darling, don’t forget to give Robert back his keys,’ she said instantly. ‘Let me introduce Loretta–’
‘We’ve met,’ said Robert, inclining his head in Loretta’s direction.
‘And Peggy. Thanks for the commode, by the way. It’s very much appreciated. Now, everybody, let’s eat. Into the hall, please.’
They filed obediently out of the room after Clara, bunching uncomfortably near the front door while they waited for instructions on where to sit. Loretta rather hoped she’d find herself next to Ellie or Here, both of whom had aroused her curiosity. Instead, she was dispatched to the far end of the table by Clara, who suddenly declared that Loretta was that night�
��s guest of honour. Robert and Gilbert were sent to sit on either side of her. Imo made to follow Robert but was collared by her mother.
‘No, darling, not up there. I need you to help me with the dishes. Peggy, you can sit by me as well.’
The Barker-Parkers, as Loretta had begun to think of them, fitted themselves into the remaining gaps as best they could, Here taking the seat between Peggy and Robert, his wife settling herself with Gilbert and Imogen. Loretta had glimpsed a look of disappointment on Imo’s face and wondered fleetingly whether Clara’s daughter had a crush on Robert. Her thoughts were distracted as a matchbox landed on the table slightly to her left.
‘Gilbert, make yourself useful,’ declared Clara, who had thrown it. She gestured towards the drunken candles, which Gilbert obediently lit. At the other end of the table, Imo did the same. Clara turned off the overhead light, plunging them into a gloom which made Loretta realize how dark it had become outside. The atmosphere was rather eerie: the long table, the flickering light of the candles, the ill-assorted band of strangers, and the occasional distant roll of thunder combined to produce an air of unreality, even suspense, as though something untoward might happen at any moment. She shivered, and Robert leaned towards her.
‘Cold?’ he asked. ‘Have you got a jacket or something? That dress doesn’t look very warm. Though it’s very ... elegant.’
Loretta assured him she’d be all right. ‘I thought I felt a draught from the back door,’ she invented, ‘but it’s stopped now.’
‘I gather you’re a don,’ Gilbert said from her left. ‘Which college?’
Loretta looked at him in surprise, then told him the name of her college in London. Gilbert’s face was momentarily blank.
‘Oh, I see,’ he said, ‘so you’re not at Oxford. Somehow I’d got the idea you were at the University.’
Loretta’s hostility towards Gilbert, its seed sown during the discussion about the peace camp, began to sprout. London was just as much a university as Oxford, she thought crossly. But, for Clara’s sake, she held her peace.
‘What do you do?’ she asked, a little maliciously. She had guessed that Gilbert was retired and, from his remark about being Clara’s pensioner, not particularly well off.
‘Oh, I potter about, grow a few vegetables,’ he said lightly, turning her question away.
‘Don’t listen to him,’ Robert said. ‘Gilbert is a distinguished man of letters and he’s writing his autobiography. He’s just rather shy when it comes to talking about it.’
‘One doesn’t want to bore people with interminable reminiscence. I have a dread of people moving away when I walk into the pub, like they did with that chap who used to be in the RAF.’
‘I think that was slightly different.’ Robert grinned.
‘Are you a writer? I’m sorry, I don’t know your books ...’
‘Not a writer. A publisher. Writing about me is really a way of writing about my authors.’
‘Who were your authors? No, I really want to know.’ It took Loretta several more attempts to draw Gilbert out, interrupted by the arrival of a very good vegetable soup, but by the time the boeuf bourgignon appeared she was listening with genuine interest.
‘Congratulations,’ Robert said in a low voice as Gilbert passed his plate down for a second helping. ‘That’s the longest conversation I’ve ever known Gilbert have with a stranger. You’re a good listener.’
Loretta checked nervously to make sure that Gilbert’s attention was elsewhere and saw that he was talking to Ellie. ‘Mock Georgian coach lamps,’ Ellie was saying; they seemed to be discussing the latest piece of architectural vandalism in Flitwell.
‘I’m feeling rather guilty,’ Loretta admitted in a low voice. ‘I took against him before you arrived – he was being sniffy about the peace camp. But he’s very engaging when you get to know him.’
Robert looked at her quizzically. ‘Do you always judge people on the basis of their politics?’
Loretta was taken aback. ‘Well, yes, I suppose I do. But then, the people I meet in London, we’re all pretty much the same – anti-nuclear, feminist, green, that sort of thing.’
‘Then it’s a very good thing you’re not in London,’ Robert said. ‘It’s bad for you, always mixing with people who agree with you. Lets the mind get flabby. More wine?’
Loretta nodded, not knowing what to say. It had sounded like a snub, yet Robert was smiling affably at her.
‘I’m not sure it’s as simple as that,’ she said. ‘Surely politics can be a guide to character? But maybe you’re right. I’ll let you know when I’ve spent a week or so here.’ She had a feeling she’d deliberately ducked a confrontation, but this was, after all, a social occasion. ‘What do you do?’ she asked, repeating the question that had succeeded so well with Gilbert.
‘I write music,’ Robert said unexpectedly. He laughed. ‘That is, I sit at my piano and think about writing music, and occasionally I actually do it. It’s a very pleasant existence.’
‘Actually, Loretta’ – Imo’s voice floated down from the other end of the table – ‘Robert’s very famous. You must have heard of him.’
‘Very probably,’ Loretta said, hoping her ignorance of contemporary music was not about to be exposed. She turned back to Robert. ‘But I don’t know your surname.’
‘Herrin,’ called Imo. ‘Didn’t I tell you?’
Loretta was relieved; she recognized the name from concert posters she’d seen on the London Underground, even though she had no idea what kind of music Robert composed.
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Flitwell obviously isn’t as rural as I’d supposed. I expected it to be full of farmworkers and smallholders, not publishers and composers.’
There was a slight edge to her remark which Robert was quick to pick up.
‘And what about where you live?’ he asked. ‘What kind of people live there? Islington, I should say, or just maybe Fulham?’
‘Islington,’ Loretta agreed, wondering where this conversation was about to lead.
‘Islington? I used to have a very tiny flat down by the Angel. Where are you?’ Gilbert had overheard the last part of the conversation.
Loretta told him she lived in Liverpool Road and they began to compare notes about the area. Robert’s attention was distracted by Here, and Loretta settled back and began to enjoy the evening again.
Conversation flowed unforcedly round the table – even Peggy, coaxed by Here and Robert, seemed to be joining in. It was not until the hate cake made its appearance, to general acclaim, that Loretta realized how tired she was. Perhaps it was the soft darkness of the room, or the gentle rhythm of the rain overhead, but she longed to curl up on the yellow velvet chaise-longue in Clara’s study. So seductive was this image that, as Gilbert handed a plate of cake to her, she realized she was in danger of nodding off. Blinking hard, she picked up her spoon, only to drop it with a clatter as a tremendous crash resounded through the room, followed by the noise of a car accelerating.
Confusion reigned; she was aware that Robert and someone else – was it Ellie? – were on their feet and a voice was – calling for lights. As the room flooded with light Clara wrenched open the front door. For a moment all Loretta could see was blood – blood running down the brown front door, over the threshold into the hall, and leaving brilliant red stains on the hem of Clara’s green and yellow dress. Then she heard Ellie’s voice – ‘Paint! It’s only paint!’ – and a collective sigh of relief ran through the room. Everyone began talking at once and Loretta edged round the table behind Robert until she was close enough to see for herself. The smell alone, she realized, was enough to prove it wasn’t blood. Of all of them, Peggy was the first to recover her wits.
‘You got a floorcloth? And a bucket?’
Imo led the way into the kitchen, leaving the others standing uselessly in the hall. Robert stepped gingerly into the road, avoiding the pool of paint, and returned with something in his hand.
‘This is what it came in,’ he said,
holding up a two-and-a-half litre paint tin with the label clumsily torn off.
‘Don’t touch it – there may be fingerprints!’ Clara’s warning was too late.
‘Sorry. I expect they wore gloves, anyway.’ Robert stood the can on the floor, well away from the front door which Imo and Peggy were now attempting to clean.
‘Hadn’t we better phone the police?’ Gilbert was the first person to think of it.
Robert offered to make the call, and disappeared into the sitting room.
‘How did they get away so fast?’ Ellie asked.
‘There was a car,’ Loretta said. ‘I heard it accelerate.’
‘I did, too,’ said Here. ‘I guess they threw that stuff out the door.’
‘Now what do you say?’ Clara suddenly whirled round to face Gilbert, her face flushed. ‘Is this what I have to put up with, just because I don’t want the base here?’
‘Clara, there’s no proof this has anything to do with the peace camp,’ Gilbert said weakly. ‘Let’s leave it to the police to find out. That’s their job.’
‘You’re telling me this is a coincidence? After last night?’ Clara was really angry now. ‘Since I allowed that peace camp on to my land there’s been one thing after–’
‘Mum, hadn’t you better change your dress? It’s got paint all over it.’ Loretta wasn’t certain but she thought there had been some sort of warning in Imo’s tone. What had Clara intended to say?
At that moment Robert returned from the sitting room. As soon as he appeared, Peggy, who was on her knees wiping up paint with old newspapers, jumped to her feet.
‘They coming?’
Robert shook his head.
‘Not yet. They’re sending a car, but it’ll be at least three-quarters of an hour. They’re short-staffed, apparently. There’s been a big crash on the M40 and they’re out at that as well as some incident in Oxford. Saturday night, I suppose. So – we wait.’ He paused. ‘Listen, Clara, why don’t you go to bed? You as well, Loretta, and Peggy. There’s no point in all of us hanging about down here. I can tell them what happened, I saw as much as you did.’