A few minutes later the child reappeared, this time with a blonde woman in tow, a different blonde woman from the one who had walked off with the suitcase. This one was older. How much older was difficult to say as she belonged to the old-fashioned school of middle age, the one that still favoured elasticated waistbands over a work-out and who believed sun was good for the skin.
Her name, she said, was Sheila Wilkinson and she was Mr Bauer’s housekeeper. The fact that she was anyone’s housekeeper, she managed to imply, was one of life’s little ironies.
‘It’s so lovely to finally meet you,’ she added. ‘I would have had you over but my little quarters don’t really lend themselves to entertaining. Although Mr Bauer has of course said that I must treat the place as my own. He’s . . .’
‘He only said that,’ the child interrupted. ‘But I don’t think he really meant it. It’s because he works with Dr Wilkinson that he feels he should.’
Sheila Wilkinson’s cheeks coloured. ‘Well, that’s just silly. Whom my ex-husband works with should have nothing to do with it. I shall have to have a word with your father.’
I felt for her. She wasn’t someone I instinctively warmed to, but I had to sympathise with anyone who had to spend her days battling the child Annie. I glared at the girl. I might have imagined it but I thought she looked a little ashamed.
‘Well, all I can say is that you don’t know how lucky you are to have your own place until it’s gone.’ Sheila made sweeping movements with her arm, taking in my little house and the pretty garden.
‘I am lucky, I know.’
Sheila peered at me. ‘There’s no need to look so upset about it,’ she said.
‘Would you like to come in for a moment?’ I asked her.
As we walked though the hall to the kitchen I apologised for the bag slung on the floor and the letters still on the mat, explaining that I had just got back from work and hoping she might take pity on me and remove the child without too much delay. Sheila said she was used to untidy houses, going on to tell me all about the mess created by Annie’s father. ‘It makes you wonder,’ she said, ‘it really does. How he can be so organised in his work, I mean.’
I opened a bottle of white wine and poured two glasses. I offered the child a glass of apple juice. She said that she would rather have coffee. I turned to Sheila, who said that Annie would love some apple juice.
I never could understand people who yearned for their childhoods. It was a time of powerlessness, a time when you couldn’t even pick your own drink. I shot the child an apologetic glance.
‘Yes, people who meet Mr Bauer at the hospital would be amazed if they saw him at home. It’s like two completely different people.’
‘Really,’ I smiled.
‘Oh, absolutely. All those little nurses and his female patients who think he’s some kind of god. “Yes, Mr Bauer, No, Mr Bauer, three bags full, Mr Bauer.” ’ She must have realised how sour she sounded because she rearranged her disappointed features into a smile. As smiles went it wasn’t very successful. I thought I would tell Uncle Ian about her. ‘She’s just like Grandmother Eva’s sister,’ I would tell him. ‘Your Aunt Berit. The one who never forgave the world.’ I realised that I had no idea for what Berit could not forgive the world. Maybe Grandmother Eva had never got around to telling us.
‘Yes, they should see him at home,’ she was saying, ‘creating chaos, slopping round in those awful old jogging bottoms.’
It was odd, I thought, this need some women appeared to have to infantilise the men around them by sharing quasi-embarrassing little facts around. Maybe it was a way of claiming ownership? ‘Daddy says he knows where everything is unless some interfering busybody has moved it all around.’
Sheila coloured, starting from the neck. Then she proceeded to talk about the weather. It was un-seasonally seasonal, we both agreed. She drank up her wine. I didn’t offer her another glass. I reckoned it was best to take this good neighbour thing one step at the time.
Turning to Annie, Sheila said, ‘You’re not to be late.’
‘Annie’s not going with you?’ I realised I was speaking rather loudly and they both looked at me, surprised.
The child said, ‘I want to show you my jug.’
‘She wants to show you her jug,’ Sheila said.
I closed the front door behind her and picked up the box. ‘All right then,’ I said to the child. ‘Let’s do this.’
Once inside the workshop I put the box on the table in my reception area and picked out the largest piece. Having inspected it I looked at Annie with renewed respect. ‘That’s some jug,’ I said. ‘Or bits of jug. How did it get broken? Did you drop it?’
Annie shook her head. ‘Daddy did.’
‘Oh dear.’
‘He threw it at the wall.’
‘Oh dear.’
She looked up at me with huge dark eyes. ‘Andrea gave it to him. I think he is sorry he broke it. Please can you mend it?’
‘It’s an expensive business, a proper restoration.’
‘Andrea gave it to him,’ she said again. Tears welled up in the brown eyes.
I stifled a sigh. Then I thought, why not? Thanks to Uncle Ian I could afford to do a bit of pro bono restoration. ‘All right. I’ll see what I can do. But it will take time. It’s not simply gluing a few bits together.’
The tears dried so quickly she might have used a blow dryer. ‘Thanks.’ She beamed a smile at me.
‘No worries,’ I said. ‘And tell your father that if he’s going to throw china around to throw something a bit less like eighteenth-century Spode.’
The child told me that he had not thrown it ‘around’ but straight at the wall. ‘He’s a very good fast bowler.’
‘I suppose you should be running along back to your place,’ I said, thinking of supper. And television.
The child had made herself comfortable, cross-legged on the chair. ‘It’s all right. Daddy won’t be back for ages yet. I might as well stay here.’
I was used to guests taking a hint. Then again I was used to adults.
‘Sheila doesn’t like girls, she only likes boys.’
‘Well, then, she’s very unfair. And she’s missing out.’
‘Actually, she really only likes Daddy. She says all he needs is the love of a good woman. I think she means herself. She says he needs to be mothered because Granny was in the jungle.’
‘What was your granny doing in the jungle?’
The child shrugged her scrawny shoulders. ‘I don’t remember. I think she’s still there, though.’
‘Really?’
Annie shrugged again. ‘We think so. I’ve certainly never seen her. Anyway, all the women tell me that Daddy needs to be mothered.’
‘All the women?’
‘Andrea and before that it was the French lady, Yvonne, and even Mummy. Well, she used to say he needed mothering but she doesn’t say it any more because she’s got two babies to look after now so she hasn’t any time for a big one. She barely has time to look after me, actually.’
I gave the child a quick glance. She sounded relaxed enough but that didn’t mean she felt that way. But she had her face turned away so I couldn’t tell for sure.
‘I liked Andrea.’ She sounded wistful.
I had felt a niggle of concern as we spoke and now I felt I had to voice it, but casually. Or as casually as one could when dealing with such a potentially serious issue. ‘Your daddy doesn’t throw things at you, does he?’
The child looked at me, surprised, then she burst into peals of laughter. ‘Daddy? Of course not.’ She turned serious again. ‘I’m sorry Andrea moved out and I think Daddy is too although he won’t admit it. It had taken me ages to get used to her.’
‘So where’s your mummy now?’
‘She’s on a divorce cruise with Auntie Megan.’
‘A divorce cruise?’
‘Yes,’ Annie nodded. ‘Auntie Megan got divorced from Uncle Tony and Mummy got divorced from Dan.’
The child’s eyes misted up. ‘I didn’t really like Dan to start with because he wasn’t Daddy and I didn’t like his boy Will either, or the new babies, but Mummy told me I had to love them because we were a family. So I did and then Mummy and Dan got divorced and now she says I shouldn’t mind because Dan isn’t even my Daddy. I don’t even see Will any more.’
‘How long’s your mummy away for?’
The child shrugged. ‘I can’t remember.’ She looked around her. ‘So what shall we do now?’
The obvious answer was, ‘I’m going to pour myself a large glass of wine and have my supper in front of the news and you are going home to bed or homework or to practising being Paris Hilton or whatever little girls do these days.’
But Annie looked up at me as if it was a given that I could think of nothing better than to spend my evening in her company. The nuances of social intercourse worked fine when it was between children. As none of them ever took a hint they could be straightforward. ‘You have to go now because I’m having my supper.’ It usually worked well, too, if both parties were adults and one might say, ‘Goodness, is that the time?’ And the other replied, ‘Oh, I’m sorry, you must be wanting your supper.’ It was mixed company that didn’t really work.
Stifling a sigh, I said, ‘Well, seeing we’re here, why don’t we take a closer look at your jug?’ I moved the box across to my worktable, where I laid out the sherds.
As I studied the pieces, Annie stood by my shoulder, breathing heavily in my ear. I wondered if she was asthmatic or maybe it was just a child thing.
‘Yup, it’s early Spode, possibly even designed by the man himself, Joshua Spode.’ I turned round to look at her. ‘You’ve done brilliantly rescuing it.’
The child straightened and her tight little mouth widened in a controlled smile. She said, ‘Sheila was going to chuck it out. She said it was just old junkshop tat not worth mending.’
Sheila would think that. I knew one’s not supposed to be quick to judge but in my opinion she was typical of the kind of woman whose soul had been left to soak for so long there was nothing of any interest left.
‘Do you know the story of the Willow Pattern?’ I asked instead.
She shook her head.
‘Once upon a time . . .’ I began, the way I knew one should with stories, ‘. . . there was a very rich and very mighty Mandarin of China, Mandarin being a minister or some such thing, who lived with his beautiful daughter Knoon-se in a great palace in a garden filled with trees and flowers. One day a young man named Chang came to work for the powerful Mandarin as his secretary. Chang was poor and lowly.’
‘Like Lowly Worm?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve ever come across him.’
‘He’s a worm.’
‘Right. Yes, I suppose a bit like a worm, but brighter and probably more handsome.’
‘Lowly Worm’s quite nice-looking. In a wormy sort of way.’
‘I suppose then Chang was quite nice-looking in a human secretary sort of way. Anyhow, he fell hopelessly in love with the beautiful Knoon-se and Knoon-se fell right back in love with Chang. They met in great secrecy every evening beneath a willow tree by the river. But the Mandarin found out and got furious because he thought that Chang, though not a worm, was still too lowly for his daughter so he told Chang to go away and never come back, ever. Then he locked poor Knoon-se in a pavilion overlooking the river and built a crooked fence all around.’
‘Couldn’t he get it straight?’
‘Good question and the answer has to be no, he couldn’t. Silly old Mandarin. Anyway, if you look at this piece here,’ I pointed, ‘you can see a bit of the fence.’
Then the doorbell went. It was Sheila. ‘Annie really has to come home now,’ she announced, as if she expected some kind of argument from me, something along the lines of, ‘No, no, please don’t take this child who just appeared on my doorstep and wants me to do major restoration work for free while stopping me from having my supper, awaaaay from me!’
‘I’ll call her,’ I said.
The child came skipping along the passageway at the back. ‘Is that my daddy?’ When she saw that it was Sheila her little face took on a sullen look and her skips became a shuffle. But Sheila didn’t seem to notice. She patted her hip the way you do to get a dog or a small child to follow. ‘Come along now, dear.’
From the way Annie was skipping along at her side I deduced that things were not quite as bad between them as all that. I was about to close the door behind them when the monster car drove into the square and parked on the far side. As he got out and locked up I thought Jacob Bauer had had a tough day. I recognised the signs from Gabriel: the tense, hunched shoulders, the downturned gaze, the hand raking through the hair. Then he spotted his daughter, who had pulled away from Sheila and was running towards him, and he straightened up the way Gabriel used to do when he realised I was watching him, and gave her a big smile. She hugged his waist and he ruffled her hair and then they walked, hand in hand, up to the gate of Number 12.
I don’t know whom I envied the most, him for having a daughter or her for having a father or both for having someone to take by the hand.
Twenty-eight
Sandra/Cassandra
I made myself sick enough to be sent home. When I returned to school a week later I knew they had all been talking about me. Gillian and the others tiptoed around me as if someone had died. Rose and Portia were nice in that exaggerated, self-satisfied way everyone was nice to the smelly old people the school made us all visit once a term. Eliza was all right, though. She didn’t say anything much and she didn’t give me pretend sorry looks, she just gave me a drawing of Näcken that she knew I really liked. ‘You don’t need to put it up or anything.’ I blu-tacked it on the wall above my bed. Quite apart from anything else, it was generally believed around the school that Eliza would make it big as an artist one day so who knows how valuable something like that might become.
I wanted to tell Eliza everything. I wanted her to know that I wasn’t having some silly unrequited crush on Julian. The others could believe what they liked but Eliza was different. I wish she’d see how alike we really were, she and I. Much more so than Rose and she. We had the same interests. We were both musical, both artistic. She was nowhere near as good on the violin as I was on the piano but I wouldn’t mind accompanying, even.
I had thought about all those things when I was at home lying in the gross faux-rococo bed in my room and with my mother hovering anxiously outside, listening for sounds of puking. So they’d leave me alone I told them I had a stomach bug and even just talking made me feel sick. In fact I ended up having to call for Mum to come and keep me company, they left me so alone. When I did see her she looked at me in a funny way, though, almost as if she were frightened. I shouldn’t have got so angry. I regretted it now, having smashed up my collection. Not because it was worth very much because it wasn’t, but because I’d been collecting those little animals for ever and there were some really pretty ones like the unicorn. I was sorry the unicorn was gone.
Most of all, as I lay there, I had thought of Julian. J.U.L.I.A.N. I had forgiven him. It’s what you did when you loved someone. I’m not stupid. I’d worked out that he lied when he had said he was keeping us secret because it made it more special. He was ashamed of me. I knew that now. But I saw too that it wasn’t his fault. It was his sister and Rose. They were behind it all. He was totally under Portia’s thumb, that was obvious. Their parents were always favouring her. They were all complete over-achievers and Julian was always having to think of things that would win their approval. I suppose bringing home little Miss Perfect Rose Bingham would get him that. But it was me he wanted. I just had to make him see he didn’t need to be ashamed. I had to help him.
The first night back at school, and after she’d given me the drawing, Eliza brought two cups of hot chocolate into my cubicle and asked if I felt like hanging out. She chatted about nothing much and then she said, ‘You know, boys
aren’t really so important. It’s easy to think they are but there’s so much else in life. I mean, think about it; we’re young and healthy and we’re getting a brilliant education and we have dreams we’re going to fulfil. Boys are just a part of that. If I had to choose between my work and a boy my work would win every time. And you’re good enough to become a professional musician if you work hard and don’t get distracted.’ She had drawn her long legs up under her and was sitting there at the foot of my bed, her eyes all shiny. ‘I think of the future as this big room filled with wonderful things and all we need to do is open the door and walk in. So,’ she gave me a big grin and a friendly buddy-buddy punch on the shoulder, ‘who needs boys?’
I know she was trying to help. And although I was pleased that she recognised that I was talented I wished she’d understand that Julian was my room full of wonderful things and so I couldn’t allow him to leave me.
Two days later we were playing the girls from Skipton Ladies’ College at lacrosse and as we used the LABs playing fields for interschool matches it was obviously a possibility that I was going to see Julian. Eliza looked all worried. ‘You’re sure you’re up to it?’ she asked as we waited for the minibus.
I gave her one of my blank looks. ‘What do you mean? Why shouldn’t I be up to it? I told you it was just a tummy bug.’
She looked uncertain but she persevered. ‘I wasn’t thinking of that. You know Julian might be there?’
I kept my blank look. ‘So?’
She did a little shrug and I thought I might have gone too far. I quickly smiled. ‘It’s nice of you to care.’
She was all sunshine again. ‘That’s OK.’ She bent her long neck and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek before turning away to speak to Rose, who had come up behind us.
I insisted I wanted to sit on my own at the back. When no one was looking I raised my hand to the bit of my cheek that she had kissed. Eliza confused me. Just as she was about to seriously annoy me she did something sweet, like she actually cared.
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