A Proper Family Christmas

by Jane Gordon - Cumming

  “Oh, - er, thank you.” Frances came back to earth as she handed Kath her empty bowl. It wasn’t just food she’d brought her, - but food for a great deal of thought!

  “It really isn’t fair, - poor little Tobias had never played before! The children should have been given a start.”

  “They should have been given a handicap, if you ask me! Quite unfair to pit their nimble little fingers against these stiff old hands.”

  God, were they still arguing about that game?

  “Oh come on, Gran, you very nearly won, from what I heard! If Oliver hadn’t got that last minute King…”

  “Yes, and that King of Clubs was mine,” Margery glared at the offender, who was heedlessly stirring the pan of soup. “I had it only three cards further down! …Mind you,” she went on generously, “if William had been here he would have beaten the lot of us. I don’t know what possessed those three to sneak off like that!”

  Hilary too had been a bit surprised that Julia and Tony had seen fit to disappear, just as everyone was about to start a game.

  “Yes, we all might have liked to go to the pub, if we’d been invited!” complained Stephen, who had never been known to set foot in the White Hart. She saw his point though. If it was suddenly so essential to go for this drink, why take William along, and not the rest of them? …What, in short, were those two up to?

  “I don’t know whether we should wait for the others, or go ahead and have lunch,” she said doubtfully. The children had been fed some time ago, and persuaded to play in the garden under Shelley’s reluctant guardianship. The rest of them were rather hungrily contemplating a plate piled high with crusty bread and slices of turkey.

  “It is only sandwiches,” said Lesley, disregarding the exotic soup that Oliver had of course conjured up out of nothing.

  “And this’ll stay hot,” he said, without rancour.

  “I suppose we’d better wait a bit longer then,” sighed Hilary, pretending not to see Leo’s face fall.

  Kath came back with Frances’s bowl. “Well, that went down a treat, Oliver love!” So he was ‘love’ now, was he? “…Just what the doctor ordered, you clever old chef, you!” She went up and gave him a squeeze as he stood by the stove.

  “Thank you, Kath. I’m sure you’ll be wanting to get off home now,” said Hilary. …Not that she showed the slightest sign of wanting to leave, but Hilary felt that she’d had about as much as she could take of Kath’s company for the moment! …At least, to be fair, it was Oliver in Kath’s company she found so trying, - the constant innuendoes and little jokes suggesting that whatever happened between them last night had made them the most intimate of friends, - lovers, even, the way Kath was behaving, - and Oliver seemed to encourage, rather than doing anything to dispel this impression.

  “Oh! I thought Frances might fancy a cup of tea.”

  “I’ll make it. We really mustn’t keep you hanging around any longer. …No, that’s fine. We’ll do our own washing up.”

  Kath had finally departed, with a lingering look, but not quite kissing Oliver good-bye, when they heard Julia’s voice in the hall.

  “Hello, what are you all doing in the kitchen? I thought you were playing a game.”

  “We finished that ages ago,” Margery told her.

  “Really? Who won? …Oh, well done, Oliver darling! Daddy’ll be ever so jealous. He loves Racing Demon.”

  “If we’d known something else was being planned, we could have postponed it for another time,” said Lesley pointedly.

  “Oh, - you didn’t want to come with us, did you? We only popped down for a quick one before lunch.”

  “Well it’s ready now,” said Hilary. “Where’s William? He must be hungry. You know how early he eats as a rule.”

  “That’s okay,” said Julia, “he’s had his, - we all have. They do such nice meals at the pub, that we thought we might as well eat there. …Oh dear, I hope you weren’t waiting for us!”

  There was a pained silence. Margery rolled her eyes, and began to hand bowls out. Hilary did the same with the plates. Daniel grinned, and helped himself to one of the sandwiches. “I’ll take this up and have it with Frances. Is that her tea?”

  “How sweet! They can’t be parted for a minute, can they?” cooed Julia, as he disappeared upstairs.

  “What do you mean?” Lesley paused in the act of spooning soup.

  “Oh darling, didn’t you know?” Julia glanced round mischievously, as if they all shared a secret. “Daniel and Frances have got a thing going!”

  “You mean, - they’re romantically involved?” Only Stephen could put it like that.

  “It seems so.”

  “Isn’t that nice?” said Hilary, knowing the Shirburns wouldn’t agree.

  “Darling Hilary’s being very understanding.” Julia treated her to a sympathetic little smile, which set her teeth on edge.

  “Rubbish! I’ve a lot of time for Frances.”

  “Oh, of course, - she’s a sweet girl.” A ‘but’ hung in the air.

  “Daniel’s having a relationship with our nanny?” Stephen struggled to take it in. “Oh dear, I’m afraid that won’t do.” He turned to Lesley for confirmation.

  “No,” she came back to life, “no, I’m afraid it would be most unsuitable. …One has to think of Tobias, after all. He’s at a most impressionable age.”

  “Why? Are you afraid it might corrupt his morals?” Oliver couldn’t help enquiring.

  Aware of his amusement, Lesley glared nastily at him. “Yes, well, - you’d know!”

  Oh God, - stupid woman! So that was why she and Stephen had always seemed so anxious to keep him at arm’s length from their precious son. It was nothing to do with the damp patch in the pantry.

  Oliver glanced round the table for enlightenment as to this unprovoked attack, but Margery could only give a mystified shrug, and Stephen dropped his gaze. Julia tittered and, failing to catch Hilary’s eye, tried Leo, - but he, with his usual self-concern, was the only one of them carrying blithely on with his lunch. Hilary wanted to scream at Lesley that she was way behind the times. All the signs were that Oliver Leafield wasn’t gay at all, even if he did have a very strange taste in women.

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” She felt she must say something. “Tobias won’t care who his nanny is seeing, - and you can hardly tell her who she can or can’t fall in love with!”

  “But it’ll make things so awkward…”

  Yes, if Frances was attached to a member of the family, the Shirburns might have to start thinking of her as a human being instead of a servant. Most inconvenient for them!

  “Can’t you have a word with Daniel?”

  “No of course I can’t! Good heavens, do you think anything I said would put him off? Even if I did want to discourage the relationship, that would be the very worst way of going about it!”

  “But you’re his mother…”

  “Precisely.”

  “We men are very perverse,” explained Oliver.

  He could say that again! …What could he possibly see in a woman who was such a contrast to him in every way, someone with absolutely no pretensions to culture or refinement, someone as plump, and brassy, and blatantly sexual as Kath Arncott? If that was his type, he might as well be gay as far as Hilary was concerned, because she herself certainly had no chance!

  “So what are we going to do?”

  “I don’t know.” Daniel stared out of the window at where the children were playing in the garden.

  Frances sipped her tea, relieved to be sharing the burden of her news. “At least Oliver’s not gay, - but I can’t believe he’d rather have her than your mother! I mean, Kath’s very nice, but she’s actually quite fat, and I wouldn’t have called her pretty exactly, would you?”

  “Well, I don’t fancy her,” Daniel reassured her, “but then I go for slender, mousy little women, without much to say for themselves.” He pinched her knee. “A retiring sort of guy like Oliver might be attracted by that in-your-face approach
, I suppose. You know what they say about opposites.”

  Frances wrinkled her nose. Were men really that unpredictable when it came to sex? Perhaps they were.

  “No,” Daniel went on suddenly, “he’s keen on Mum, I know he is. We’ve just got to find a way of sorting things out and getting them back together.”

  “Couldn’t you have a little chat with him, - explain what happened?”

  “You must be joking!” A look of horror came over Daniel’s face. “What am I supposed to do, - take that poor guy aside, and tell him that everyone thought he was gay? I’m sorry, but no way!”

  “We’ve been playing Desert Islands,” Tobias told his mother.

  “That sounds fun, darling.”

  “I was the castaway and Posy was the person who owned the island. She gave me special berries to eat.”

  “What?”

  “I wasn’t sick,” Tobias assured her.

  “But what did she give you? …Where’s that girl, Shelley? Why didn’t she stop her? …Stephen, come here at once! We must call a doctor!”

  “Don’t panic, Lesley,” Hilary tried to calm her. “He doesn’t look at all ill. I’m sure he would be if he’d eaten anything poisonous.” …Daniel was coming down the stairs. Thank heaven!

  “Okay, mate, how many of these things did you eat? Come and show me where you picked them, Posy.” He took charge, and led them into the garden.

  He came back a short while later, grinning and mopping his brow. “Rose-hips. That won’t do him any harm. No, it’s all right, Lesley, - full of vitamin C.”

  She would have been less reassured, however, if she’d heard what Daniel confided to Hilary when the children had been swept upstairs for a rest.

  “That wretched girl really was trying to poison him, you know! She said that she hoped Tobias would die, because then she could live here all on her own when she’s grown up!”

  “Well, Nanny, how are you getting on?” …None the better for a visit from Lesley. “Stephen and I are very sorry to see you laid up. And Tobias is missing you badly. - There was a most unfortunate incident in the garden just now! …I wonder how long it will be before you’re back on your feet?”

  Okay, she got the message! The Shirburns loved her so much, they were desperate to enjoy the pleasure of her company again. She told her what the doctor had said, and watched Lesley contort her face in a ‘harrumph’ of irritation. After that there wasn’t much to talk about, since she obviously hadn’t come to cheer her up with any little items of news or gossip, and Frances lay silent, waiting for her to go.

  But instead, Lesley drummed her fingers, sighed and gazed out of the window. Eventually, just as Frances was plucking up courage to say that she really needed to sleep now, she spoke.

  “I do hope you’re not going to get involved in any silly distractions while you’re here, Nanny.”

  Frances stared at her perplexed. What did she have in mind, - wild games of Scrabble? An over-stimulating crossword puzzle?

  “Stephen and I have always thought you were such a sensible girl, - quite unlike Tobias’s last nanny! And it’s Tobias that has to be considered here.”

  No, she still couldn’t put the clues together.

  “Children need to know exactly where the boundaries are, don’t they, in their little lives? We adults are more adaptable, but it’s very confusing for a child if his perception of where those lines are drawn should be disturbed. Poor Tobias has already had enough to upset him recently, what with his adventure yesterday, and the incident this morning…”

  Frances shook her head, still utterly mystified. What could she possibly have done, lying here in bed, to upset Tobias? He hadn’t even visited her since her accident.

  Lesley saw that she’d have to make herself clearer. At last she came out with it.

  “I understand that you’ve embarked on some kind of romantic liaison with Daniel Watlington. …Whether or not his family look kindly on such a relationship, Stephen and I thought you should know that it really won’t be acceptable to us, as your employers.”

  Frances drew in a sharp breath of disbelief.

  “We’re only thinking of the effect it will have on Tobias. - He’s very fond of his cousin. …As I said, you’re a sensible girl,” Lesley went on, when Frances could find no reply to this non sequitur. “I’m sure you wouldn’t want to cause any embarrassment, especially to young Daniel.” She patted the bedclothes in a would-be friendly manner. “We can’t always follow our own desires, when there’s other people to consider, can we?”

  “Are we going to have Grime and Brine round again?” asked Posy, fresh from a ‘nap’ in which Hilary suspected little sleeping had been done.

  “No, darling, not today.”

  “Can we go round to their house?”

  “No,” Lesley backed Julia up, “Grime and Brine are busy this afternoon.”

  “But Mrs. Arncott said they’d like to ‘return our hostipality’,” Posy reminded her aunt with a sceptical look, “and they got Roadkill V for Christmas.”

  “There are much nicer things we could play here,” said Lesley quickly, seeing her son about to express a heartfelt longing for Roadkill V.

  “Oh yes, - that islands game!” His eagerness suggested he bore no ill will for its dietary contingencies.

  “No, not that,” said Lesley, glaring at the insouciant Shelley, who, having done her duty of bringing the children down, was lounging in one of the sitting-room chairs.

  “Let’s find something we can all do,” said Julia. “…Gosh, there are lots of us, aren’t there?”

  “What about a quiz?” said Stephen.

  “That’s no good, - we haven’t any questions,” said Lesley. “Oh dear, we should have brought Trivial Pursuit.”

  “Good heavens, anyone can set a quiz!” exclaimed Leo. “It doesn’t take many brain cells to look up a few reference books.”

  “Good man, Leo,” Stephen took this as an offer. “There are plenty of dictionaries and things in the study.”

  “Oh! …Well, all right then. I won’t be long. You could be finding pencils and paper.”

  “Or what about charades?” said Julia, when he’d gone. “That’s huge fun, and the children always love dressing up.”

  “We’ve got enough for three teams…” Tony began to divide them up. “Four Shirburns with William. Three Britwells plus Shelley. …Yes of course you are, Shell, you’ll love it!”

  “…And me, Mum and Gran, with Oliver,” Daniel finished for him. “You can be an honorary Watlington.”

  “Many thanks.” Oliver came and sat beside Hilary.

  “We’d better get the rules straight, first of all,” said Margery, with an eye on Lesley. One of the grudges the family had against her was that she had been taught the miming version. “We’re not doing it that silly American way! …Oliver, do you know how to play this?”

  “You take a word, and act out each syllable?”

  “No, you’ve got to introduce the syllable into each scene, with the whole word in the last one.” Margery was a strict upholder of the version played in the Shirburn household for the past few decades.

  “You’re supposed to slip them casually into the conversation,” Hilary explained to him. “But it’s quite difficult to find something normal-sounding. Otherwise it sticks out like a sore thumb and everyone spots it immediately.”

  “We mustn’t have things that are too hard for the children to guess…”

  “Yes, Lesley, we’re not going to ruin the game, just so Tobias can win!” Margery told her. “Come on, get into your teams and think up your words. - No more than three syllables, or it takes for ever. You can stay here, Lesley, - we’ll never get William out of that chair. Julia’s lot can have the hall.”

  “Isn’t this fun? Just like when we were little! I wonder where the old dressing-up box got to…”

  “Only a quarter of an hour to plan in!” Margery gave a final order, as she led her own team towards the kitchen. “If we letting them
start messing about with costumes, they’ll be all day!” she added, before the door was quite closed.

  Oliver thought of a word at once. “Sentiment,” he suggested, Julia’s last remark obviously echoing in his ears.

  “Oh yes: ‘sent’ - ‘tea’ - ‘meant’, - that’s good!” Daniel nodded.

  “Hm, cheating really, using the consonant twice,” said the Authority, “but I bet they do!”

  “Okay,” said Oliver, “what if you and Hilary are a mother and daughter, and we’ve been sent to tell you some bad news…”

  With each of them contributing to the increasingly unlikely plot, they ended up with a melodrama, in which Oliver arrived to tell Daniel’s mother and sister that he’d shot him in a duel. Despite the offender’s breach of good taste in bringing the body along behind him, they still felt compelled to offer him a cup of tea, and he was then to assure them he’d never meant to do it, with a final scene in which the mother was to declare herself overcome with sentiment.

  “…No, that’s too obvious.” Daniel waved an objecting hand. “We need to make it more complicated, or they’ll get it at once. Suppose this guy and the daughter fall in love?”

  “…Though they ‘never meant this to happen’!” Oliver and he laughed as they chorused the words together. “And then the son, who turns out not to be quite dead after all, objects, and he’s got a gun…”

  “What a load of rubbish!” Margery chuckled at the finished result. “Now, where are we going to get our props from?”

  Her quarter of an hour had been exceeded by about times three, when at last everyone was back in the sitting-room, ready to perform. The Shirburns went first with a classical theme.