After a few minutes he stood up. The wind competed with his cries of pain and almost lost as the three of them walked back to the lighthouse, with Florence and Alan propping up the man as best they could.
Once successfully indoors, Florence took the man into the kitchen and asked Alan to phone for an ambulance. The man said he’d be all right. It was the first time they’d heard his voice, which was cockney and urgent. His face was prematurely lined, Florence suspected, and his clothes hadn’t received much attention recently. She insisted a professional see him and though he looked as if he wanted to argue, his pain and a general fatigue prevented him. She opened the cupboard above the cutlery drawer where she knew the first aid box was and lifted it out.
“I’m going to take it that we have a collarbone injury here,” she told the man.
He thought she seemed to know what she was doing, so he didn’t argue. What the hell was this old couple doing here anyway? Did they live here?
She asked him to put his left fingertips on the collarbone that was OK and then she took his right hand and placed it under his left elbow.
“There, that’s what we want,” she said, satisfied that everything was as it should be. She took a clean hand towel from one of the drawers and placed it against his chest, then took the cellophane off a wrapped bandage, opened it up and started making some sort of shape with it.
“Have you had a prang?” she asked him.
He looked at her.
“Have you had an accident?”
“Yeah,” he answered and she started saying something about how he got his injury, but he was in too much pain to listen.
“The ambulance people said they’d be here as soon as they can,” reported Alan, “but warned us they might be delayed because apparently it’s started snowing down there.”
“You told them what we suspected it might be?”
Alan nodded. “They said to ring again if things get worse. They’ll give us advice over the phone.”
“Oh, I’m sure they will,” said Florence, who noted the look of alarm in the man’s face at the prospect of any delay.
She looked at his poor, troubled expression, which seemed to have to do with more than a collarbone, and felt there probably wasn’t anyone unduly concerned about his whereabouts. There wasn’t much she could do about that, but she could help out with a painkiller and, having taken the precaution of checking this was all right with the ambulance team, she gave him the soluble sort, holding the glass and getting him to slowly sip the powdery water. She could smell the cold coming off his face. He was in a sorry state and she almost thought he wasn’t going to make it as his chapped lips quivered against the rim of the glass. As the drops of water fell into his throat and his Adam’s apple rhythmically moved to take it down, her mother’s poorly face came to mind and she remembered the story of the dormouse. She smiled to herself. She never had seen him.
“Good,” she said as he finished the medicinal drink. “That should help a bit,” and she gently patted powdery remnants off the sides of his mouth. “Do you know where we are?” she asked him.
“The lighthouse.” He grimaced and looked slightly annoyed at the question.
She confirmed his reply and then wondered if he knew its history. His blank look proved to be no match for her determination and Florence continued, undeterred and encouraged to see that his expression had improved to a state of vacancy rather than pain.
So she began her story about Guglielmo Marconi. If he could try to listen, it might help him take his mind off things.
“Who?” he asked and she smiled broadly. It had been a long time since anyone had asked her a question.
She told him about who Marconi was, his work with radio and how he’d worked in this very kitchen to bring about the first ship-to-shore message between where they were sitting and a ship called the East Goodwin in the English Channel and she looked at the closed curtains as if to indicate where the Channel was. She told him how important this had been. How, for instance, so many more people would have drowned after the Titanic had sunk if there hadn’t been the use of radio between ships. He knew about the Titanic? He nodded.
Her witterings bored him at first and he wanted to say, “Just shut up, you silly old bat, I’m in agony here,” but the painkillers she’d given him, though not really doing much of a job, seemed to have, at any rate, stopped him shouting out, and he found himself listening to bits of what she was telling him. Something about an old geezer who’d found a way of ships talking to people on land. She was obviously very into what she was going on about. And when he winced she’d tell him to hold on and said the ambulance wouldn’t be long. But she’d said that a few times now and though he hadn’t wanted them to call one, he wanted it to get here as quick as it could now.
She had quite a nice face but not the sort of face he could tell stuff to. How he’d got into this bloody mess. That bloody ex-wife of his. God, the pain. Still, it was worth it. Ramming into the back of lover boy’s BMW. Well worth it. And nobody could trace it back to him. So he’d run into a tree. Accidentally. He’d thought he could push his old banger off the cliff. But that hadn’t worked out.
She was telling him about this radio bloke doing his work here. Where they were. He was in agony, but it was quite interesting, so he asked her about who he was exactly. Some guy called Marconi. Italian. Sounded like one of those blokes in that old film his uncle used to watch. His uncle. Yeah, yeah. Whatever you say, Mum. Anyway, she was talking about this guy and radios and how it had started all this communication. Had helped the Titanic, apparently. That film. God, how Shelley used to go on about it, even though she’d first seen it when she was just a little girl.
“You wouldn’t stick our arms out on the edge of a boat.”
No, he bloody wouldn’t. What kind of a prat does that?
“You’re not romantic, you.” How many times had he heard that one? How many times? And he always hated how she said “you” at the end of it as if there was no greater crime on the planet than not being romantic. Never mind that he’d said “yes” to two kids and done his best with them. Still, his best was obviously not good enough for our Shelley and that bloody mother of hers. What they meant was, he didn’t earn enough. Well, they knew what they could go and do. This old soul probably didn’t even know the word, but she did seem to know a lot about this Italian bloke. So he found himself asking questions, like when did this all happen? Eighteen something or other. Christmas Eve. Felt like Christmas now, what with all this snow coming down. What happened after that? The first international transmission to France, apparently. What happened to him then? The Italian government wasn’t interested in his ideas of wireless communication. Ha, losers. So he came here.
The phone rang. Alan picked it up. They could hear his monosyllables. Then he walked back into the kitchen.
“The ambulance said it’s trying as hard as it can, but the weather means it probably won’t get here for another half-hour or so. They asked if we were OK and I said we should be all right for half an hour,” and he looked at the man, who gave a small smile.
“Yes, that should be all right,” agreed Florence. “I think we all could do with a cup of tea and I’ll carry on with my story,” and she grinned as broadly as she could remember at the stranger.
He had to laugh. In absolute agony and here he was, about to have a cuppa. But there was no getting away from it. What she was saying was interesting. He might even go and look up this guy.
TRIFLE IN THE TOPIARY
Figs? What on earth was Roger talking about now? She must have had a little doze and was coming out of a dream in which her dear friend was claiming to grow figs in Wiltshire. Or had she just missed a bit and the reference was actually to his Tuscan garden? Really, she was quite cross with herself if she’d disappeared into the land of nod. Mind you, at least she’d heard a bit, probably woken by
Cecily making quite a clanking noise piling up the plates ready to put back into the hamper. Bless her, she’d provided a delightful supper for them all. How many years had they been coming? And she’d never missed a trick.
Did that mean figs were going to feature in the dessert? Or perhaps with the coffee? We shall have to wait and see. She certainly didn’t remember them appearing in the Waldorf salad. Oh dear, and it was such a lovely evening. She sat up a little to savour the view.
Cecily asked her if she’d like a cushion to sit on, but she declined. She was quite all right. She feared making herself too comfortable. Otherwise, Mr Sleep would reach for her again and Roger would, in all probability, be the proud owner of a camel. Either that or her dream would consist of Roger being asked by the BBC to take them round his Italian villa. But she remembered now. That had happened and Roger had politely declined, saying it was only an excuse for a group of voyeurs to have a holiday on public money. And he hadn’t wanted to run the risk of resultant tourist interest, especially after what had happened to his friend Oscar, safely ensconced in a very nice little pad, a few kilometres up the road, but who now faced the dreadful prospect of the second and fourth Sundays of every summer having British holidaymakers plodding around the estate. And that was only after some gardener TV bloke on a curious channel nobody had ever heard of decided to spend a week eating poor old Oscar’s grub and generally using his facilities for a show that lasted only forty-five minutes. Poor old Oscar. He never could resist a bit of pressure. Far too nice a bloke for words.
Yes, she’d thought at the time, far too nice a bloke, as Roger always insisted on referring to Oscar, who was now pocketing quite a bit of money. Poor old Roger, he often thought he was making a strong stand when actually he didn’t always think things through properly.
The air was expectant and quietly jovial and there was a general bustle and laughter, punctuated by conversation where sentences such as “Oh no, Bengal would be far preferable” and “The rocket’s from our Sussex garden” could be heard, understated utterances that didn’t in any way suggest the peacock was parading its feathers. Just normal talk.
She looked out at the slightly sodden view. How wonderful rain was, for despite the slight inconvenience of it not having achieved the accolade of a beautiful summer’s evening, this was beauty of a different kind altogether and the rain, like Brasso on silver, had brought back nature’s finest colours. It was truly magnificent and she pondered over how many different shades of green she could see in any one view. In reality, probably about half a dozen, but in such an enthusiastic moment, and this is what music always did to her, it felt like hundreds of varying hues. She absolutely adored how far out she could see, how many miles beyond where she was sitting. The possibility of so much more.
Though captivated by what was before her, she could still hear Roger. He was telling everyone how damned hard he worked. She recognised his voice, of course, but she also knew the words. They were, after all, his mantra. She would never try to deny it for she was sure the words were absolutely true, but the thing Roger couldn’t quite get hold of was that so did everybody else. She was very sure, for instance, that Roger and Diana’s daily worked very hard indeed. Carol wouldn’t be allowed a penny if she didn’t. But she was far too old to make this remark to her beloved nephew, not because the energy to do so was sapped out of her but because Roger would consider the remark of someone so much his senior as unworthy of much cogitation. Not that Roger ever cogitated much, being pretty much the opposite of reflective and dwelling almost entirely in the present.
Her attention was taken by a young man sitting on the grass near a summerhouse where a small group of people were enjoying a crisp white tablecloth, candles and a small vase of roses she’d noticed them setting up about an hour before. The man was rummaging in a plastic supermarket carrier bag. Out came a piece of chicken, followed by a roll and what looked like a tomato. Using his bag as a plate he tucked into the food with enthusiasm and hunger, his cutlery his fingers. Not a champagne glass anywhere near him and no crockery in sight. Cecily probably wouldn’t approve, but secretly, she thought the food was almost certainly tastier. Like fish and chips out of newspaper.
“Figs, Hester?”
She was just admiring the cypress and slightly resented the figs appearing again but turned her attention from the beautiful tree to the others, if only to resolve the mystery. Diana beamed at her. She had a lovely smile. Quite lovely. Roger should remember that when he was counting the coffers.
“Hester,” Diana began and proceeded to give her news that the others had decided they were too full for dessert at the moment and thought they’d settle for coffee. Was that all right with her and did she want a fig with her coffee? So coffee and figs was the idea. She replied that she’d like figs very much. Diana apologised for not remembering whether she took sugar. Diana was forever apologising. No, she didn’t take sugar.
She thanked Diana when both arrived and remarked on what a treat figs were. She couldn’t remember when she’d last eaten them. And Diana smiled in good part but nevertheless wearily, saying how Roger wasn’t going to let her forget his prize produce. Adrian, their gardener, had persuaded them to grow figs and much research had gone into the project. But she begged Hester not to say anything, even if she thought them the most delicious things ever.
She’d sometimes thought in the past that Roger and Diana were a pretty odd coupling. He was so loud, so grandiose in his demeanour; everything the large gesture, the theatrical stroke. And Diana was so contained she often wondered how her nephew’s wife had never, as far as she could tell, exploded with sheer exasperation. But to this day, she’d supported him throughout all his business ventures, even the slightly misguided ones. When was it he’d come up with “aprons for the twenty-first-century woman” with their mobile phone pocket? Maybe sometimes he should check his ideas with his dear old aunt and she smiled, closed her eyes and listened.
If the saxophone, playing to the right of her, was a little softer, it would be within a whisker’s distance of taking her into a hotter clime, heavier and almost putrid with its smoky, sweaty aromas and she would be tipsier than she should be and laughing coarsely in a way no one on these shores had ever heard. Her society in England had taught her long ago that nothing good ever came of a lady’s belch or belly-laugh. She hadn’t minded. Belching was unattractive and nothing had greatly amused her.
But that summer she’d come to understand the extent of her previous deprivation when Nathaniel had piled far more on her plate than seemed polite and had regaled her with stories and insights that had reached for her stomach and pulled out a laughter that was a complete stranger to her. And she watched him make slight mockery of her sense of the order of things when he’d officially introduced her to the members of his band, but he was so kind there was nothing offensive about it. She was so unaccustomed to everything she was encountering that novelty far outweighed overstepping the mark. “Nathaniel, Nathaniel, wherefore art thou?” she supposed she should’ve asked and taken herself back to the hotel, full of luxury and her family, but her body was shaking with joy and she didn’t know Nathaniels existed, so she surprised herself by falling into the arms of this man with whom she seemed to share little, different in everything from experience to skin colour, at a time when those things mattered to people who knew nothing. For two weeks they’d fallen in love and when she’d returned home letters, not kisses, had passed between them. She’d collected them at the post office. Nobody ever knew. She smiled. Good thing those letters had been written. Good thing she’d taken heed of Nathaniel and set up this jazz festival. How inspirational he was. How wonderful no one had found out it had been her. Something that had begun in that damp church hall and was now housed by a family’s garden. They adored the music and said it deserved better. And the trust had agreed.
She tapped to the music with fingers that had what she liked to think of as an arthritic e
legance all of their own, taking knuckles and nails off in unusual directions. What would Nathaniel have made of them? “Hester,” he’d have probably said, “these fingers show me just how tedious youthful beauty can be,” because she’d heard him say it once to a woman probably four times older than they were then.
“The figs are delicious, Roger, you’ve quite surpassed yourself this time.” Dear oh dear, she thought, Diana wasn’t going to thank Cecily at all.
She turned her head back into the cloister where the musicians were thoroughly enjoying themselves and the growing evening was allowing beautiful lighting between each archway to show itself off. It was such a small space she could have touched the singer. Leaves cascaded down from the columns and there was definitely a smell of sweet peas in the air. The musicians took a short break and one perched his bass against the small font that sat in the middle. This wasn’t England, she thought to herself again and was amused at how she surprised herself with this thought each year she came. So continental, she could almost hear Italian plainsong.
There was music elsewhere, Cecily informed her when those musicians had finished and they all trundled off to the area where the topiary was, with Diana and Roger carrying the fold-up chairs. Safely settled in these, they could see another band, louder and brasher than the other, and Cecily winced a bit. But she loved it and she loved the couple who’d taken it upon themselves to dance a salsa in front of the pianist, so sensual in their movements it almost felt voyeuristic. But nobody cared.
Diana persuaded everyone it was at last time for dessert and produced individual trifles, rich and creamy with fresh raspberries at the bottom that were also, no doubt, from their garden. Let’s hope they’re as good as the figs, she thought. They were, but in deference to Diana she didn’t say anything. She scooped out a spoonful of cream, custard and fruit – there was alcohol in this – and thought of a time when she and Nathaniel had danced, weaving around one another with steps that were challenged by almost constant giggling. And not a fig in sight.
The Writing on the Wall and Other Stories Page 18