Muriel's Reign

by Susanna Johnston

  ‘Always up a ladder fixing a bit of lighting. In and out, I am, like a fiddler’s elbow.’

  A lady at the office number listed for Rank Productions said, ‘No.’ No Mr Reardly had ever worked there as far as she knew. She would check, of course, but felt there must be some mistake. ‘Another firm, dear, called Rank, I daresay. There are plenty of them. The fur trade perhaps?’

  Phyllis was never able to track down Fred’s past. Never, entirely, did she find out how he had passed his days or where he had found inspiration for the stories he cooked up for her about the film industry as they ate out.

  For a short while she continued with the cleaning job but soon the flat was reclaimed by an angry landlord who tried to make Phyllis pay back rent as Fred’s few possessions were confiscated and his employment as burglar hinted at.

  A live-in job was her only hope and it was with that only hope that she read the lines in a domestic journal: ‘Carer needed for elderly gentleman. Nursing experience not essential.’

  The advertisement took her to Lincolnshire where Jerome Atkins lived and where his mind had started to judder.

  Arthur Stiller, solicitor, had interviewed her and deemed her suitable. He liked a pretty face and Phyllis’s was prettier than any of the other applicants.

  He said, ‘Bear with me,’ as he left her on a chair in his office – ‘I must have a little think.’ He had already decided to offer her the post.

  She stretched her eyes when she was shown the vast house and stretched them further when she was shown to an attic room, roses papered on walls and ceiling, and told it was where she was to make her home. Old furniture too – and oil paintings. It was not hers – but surely a fortune lurked.

  Other members of the household were hostile and the outdoor staff disdainful but it suited her in several ways.

  Her first meeting with Jerome Atkins, her new employer, was encouraging. His wife was alive but only just and lived in seclusion in a cut-off wing of the place with her own team of helpers.

  He looked younger than his eighty-four years, had a good head of white hair, winged eyebrows and tight, hard, unwrinkled skin.

  Mrs Atkins died soon after Phyllis’s arrival. Her husband was little affected by the event but enjoyed Phyllis decking him out for the funeral service, conducted by Dawson in the village church. She brushed his collar, polished his shoes and tucked a handkerchief into the pocket of his dark suit.

  Nothing she did inched her nearer to extracting promises from him although, as he grew daily pottier, he enjoyed telling her of his astonishing wealth. ‘Me. Me. Very rich, you know. Oh yes. Very rich indeed. You – like some?’

  Phyllis would have loved some but never knew when to strike or even whether or not the iron was hot. She had no knack.

  ‘Write down,’ he insisted. ‘Write it down. Write down what you want.’ But it was not for her to do the writing. Once he did hint that he had asked Arthur Stiller to draft something in her favour but she was never able to find out more about it.

  He became ever more taunting and unpleasant and she performed her tasks with less enthusiasm – allowing his clothes to become rank and his shoes scuffed.

  Several years had passed and Phyllis had become a part, albeit a lazy and discontented one, of the household and, with the possibility of Jerome ‘doing something for her’ nothing better had cropped up.

  Then the blow. As Jerome’s mental powers deteriorated, this flipping Muriel had been sent for. Heiress as it turned out. Jerome had mentioned a ‘niece’ occasionally but never with conviction.

  Phyllis searched for any form of concealed codicil but nothing showed. Nothing promised. Nothing but loneliness and insecurity. Even her mother had died. She didn’t know if her auntie still lived in the small town in Wales where she had spent her childhood.

  Chapter 4

  Muriel, comparing the date with her first terrifying Christmas as owner of Bradstow Manor, was very nearly contented. It was excellent to have Peter to help in all matters. What was not so good but indeed a horrible hindrance, a constant embarrassment and nagging reminder of dire days, was to have Hugh living in barely suppressed fury in the squash court.

  Muriel had fallen in love with Peter, gradually but passionately, during the years of her husband’s infidelities and had, after many a complication, become his lover and constant companion.

  Peter had braved himself to allow for the unorthodoxy of the circumstances and to rise above the dilemma relating to his personal footing in the house.

  Being blind – he fancied himself, too, to be invisible. He doted on Muriel and was assured of the inexorability of the reinforcement that he provided for her. He lived in accord with a strange compensatory law that allowed him to enjoy what was on offer.

  Hugh had always, since childhood, been foul to him – condescending and prickly. Foul, too, in Peter’s view, to Muriel – subjecting her to humiliation and contempt, grotesquely underestimating her magnificence.

  Peter planned to lie low. After all he cost nothing. Hugh could never charge him with venality. Even after waiving the rent from his London house in order to provide his futile nephew with an income, he was able to support his own modesty of financial need. Neither Hugh nor Marco had a case of that nature for him to answer. He was tremendously happy.

  Muriel had lived in the house for over a year but didn’t count the Christmas gone by as a true one for she had been beset with problems that lacked pattern.

  She’d had no idea, then, who was supposed to drag in the tree; where it was normally placed or if, indeed, there had ever been a tree in the house at Christmas.

  This year she was more organised in her crowded brain but sincerely wished that Mambles wasn’t coming and bringing ‘Mummy’, Cunty, Farty and Moggan the driver.

  Then there was the problem of her son Marco, her daughter-in-law Flavia and Cleopatra the baby – nearly a year old and badly behaved. They lived in a converted barn – also organised for them by Muriel in bossy association with Mambles. The trouble was that she had difficulty in persuading the young family to use it.

  ‘No one to babysit, Ma, and Flavia’s hopeless at house-running,’ Marco often told her as he dumped a furious Cleopatra on the floor of the kitchen and bounded with Flavia to one of Muriel’s comfortable spare rooms.

  Mambles and her mother intended to stay for an indefinite number of nights but refused to say how many.

  ‘It’s awful at Windsor now,’ Mambles had yawned down the telephone. ‘Not like it was when the King was alive. Fergie plays tiresome practical jokes and Diana won’t eat anything. Mummy’s had enough.’

  The worst problem for Muriel was finding extra men. Mambles loathed being placed next to women at meals. She was certain to encourage Hugh who flirted with her and she couldn’t stand Peter who had no inkling of how to flirt.

  Some weeks earlier she had persuaded her old and dear American friend David, to join them. He, in his own words, ‘went for anything that was on offer,’ and had accepted with amused delight. Then, only two evenings before, had telephoned to say that he was unwell and must stay at home in his solitary London flat.

  Maybe that peculiar Tommy Tiddler, who rented the old school building and who wore shawls and wobbled when he moved, would come in handy.

  There was, too, a judge, a widower, who lived nearby and who had angled for over a year to be invited by Muriel to share in her good fortune. He had been disqualified from his profession for goosing a member of the jury but, Delilah insisted, ‘It was no more than a prank.’

  Muriel had kept a letter from him, a few weeks’ old and unanswered; had thrown it into a basket where it lay near the top of a pile of incoming post. The basket was at her feet beside Monopoly and the fire. She leant to ask Peter for advice on how to handle each letter in turn as Hugh trudged past the house in melancholy puzzlement on his way to the squash court after the rectory party.

  The judge’s letter was alive with screech marks and read:

  ‘Hail once again
to my new neighbour! I know you have been busy. I’m constantly hearing of great doings under the new regime! Great tidings that Bradstow Manor has been handed down through family connections! Too many jumped-up Johnnie’s in this neighbourhood! Last thing we want are any more estate agents.’

  He told her, too, that he owned an interesting house not far from hers; that his ‘lady wife’ had died seven years earlier and that he hoped they could meet up. (Meet with Muriel – not with his wife.)

  Peter suggested inviting him to lunch on Boxing Day and Muriel wished she knew if he had been knighted before goosing the member of the jury. Wasn’t sure how to address him.

  Then there was the problem of church services. Mambles was certain to duck them but her mother, still aware of having been consort to a King Emperor, liked ceremony.

  Village jammed with detectives. Crackers. Dogs. The royal dogs, Jubilee and Sir Walter Raleigh, upsetting Monopoly and causing havoc in Dulcie’s cat kingdom.

  Her old schoolfriend, Lizzie, also had to be included. Lizzie had altered in behaviour since first hearing of Muriel’s unexpected inheritance. At that juncture she had been brittle and undermining. ‘What a foul thing to happen. I’d loathe to have to live in the country. Especially Lincolnshire.’

  A year later she chose other tactics. Poor relation tactics. ‘You are lucky. You have your live-in lover in your bed, your husband in the squash court and your son in the barn. Living alone on a budget, as I do, is a very different thing.’

  ‘I know I’m lucky,’ Muriel answered as her head burst with anxious thoughts.

  Lizzie didn’t much like Muriel; found her earthy and dowdily dressed but was, nonetheless, unstoppable in her demands.

  In Lizzie’s view Muriel was scatty and uninterested in art exhibitions or jewellery – even in clothes – but seemed to attract one drama after another and there was always a fear of missing out on excitement if she didn’t keep in constant contact by inviting herself, mercilessly, to stay.

  Muriel found Lizzie unstoppable in her deadly liveliness.

  She walked, past treasures, to the kitchen that had been improved and re-stocked since she moved in, and found Kitty preparing brandy butter to store away for Christmas Day. She ladled a large quantity of brandy, hinting that she was beginning to get familiar with the tastes of Queen Elizabeth and her daughter. Muriel asked if she knew whether or not the local judge had been knighted.

  ‘No. Poor soul. The disgrace came too soon for that. Killed his wife, they say. Not so much the disgrace as the failure to get a decoration.’

  Back in the sitting room where Peter and Monopoly talked to each other, Muriel wrote a card to the judge and to Tommy Tiddler – addressing them both correctly. Tommy’s surname was, in fact, Trout.

  She went to bed earlier than Peter. Monopoly always waited for him and it was a marvel how they never faltered in finding their way through the confusing house.

  The bedroom was uncluttered. Little for Peter to knock against. It was large and comfortable and she loved it. Loved everything except for Christmas, what it entailed, Hugh and Phyllis and the outdoor helpers.

  She did think that she loved Cleopatra in the way that she knew she ought but found her hindering and understood, as she had understood when Hugh first left her in charge of his dog, that much of her lack of enthusiasm was Marco and Flavia’s fault for dumping the baby on her at problematic moments. They were responsible for her lack of grandmotherly affection. She hoped she might enjoy Cleopatra more when she became a toddler. Muriel loved the word ‘toddler’.

  Also she had anxious doubts about Cleopatra’s paternity. Wondered whether she was, biologically, her grandmother at all. Flavia had wandered early in her marriage to Marco. Had taken up with a bounder. Possibly several.

  Chapter 5

  Muriel woke early and, after letting Monopoly into the garden, walked again to the kitchen. It was exactly eight-thirty but to her dismay she found Hugh, wearing faded corduroy trousers and a butcher’s apron, holding a teapot in one hand and a wire wool contraption in the other. He looked concerned.

  ‘Never seen a dirtier teapot, Muriel,’ he said as he scoured, ‘I thought I’d make myself useful and introduce a bit of hygiene into your domain.’

  She was sorry that Monopoly was in the garden. He might have bitten Hugh.

  ‘Another thing, Muriel,’ Hugh gathered confidence, ‘those antibiotics I found by the toaster. I’ve thrown them away. Dreadful things. I didn’t want Cleopatra to swallow them.’

  ‘Hugh. They’re mine. I’ve had bronchitis. I have to finish the course.’

  It was impossible to tell Hugh that he was not wanted in the house. They were still married. For all she knew he might be part owner although old Jerome Atkins had left it solely to her.

  It crossed her mind that Lizzie might ignite Hugh over Christmas. She had suspected that they had been up to no good together during an inharmonious patch of her marriage. There was a chance of her returning to the scene as one wallowing in an old cardigan; nestling under the duvet on the futon in the squash court during holiday festivities.

  ‘That teapot,’ she said, ‘is very old and very fragile. Please stop attacking it.’

  As her voice hardened Phyllis came in through the back door. She looked pleased as punch and her petticoat buzzed.

  Hugh turned to her and said, ‘Doing a bit of your dirty work, Phyllis.’

  ‘It’s not my job. I’m housekeeper – not maid of all work, Mr Cottle.’ She called Hugh ‘Mr Cottle’ and Peter ‘Peter’.

  Hugh looked at her with lechery and his eyes watered at her appearance but he was quickly distracted for Marco burst in; early for him. ‘We didn’t get a wink last night. Flav’s had it. So have I.’

  Cleopatra, gripped in Marco’s arms, had been crying but stopped and stretched her arms towards Muriel who had a thousand things to do and needed no delays that morning. She took the heavy baby from her son who drew away and said, ‘Thanks, Ma. I’m going to join Flav for a shut-eye.’

  Cleopatra was hot, wet and floppy and Muriel felt resentful and frantic. She sat the baby on the kitchen table and looked at her as she planned the next move. Cleopatra stared back – cool blue eyes – tremendously like Hugh’s. This realisation was mixed as a blessing, if Cleopatra amounted to such, but, if well nurtured might end up as one. The stare more or less established in Muriel’s eyes Cleopatra’s paternity and, after all, Peter – although a total opposite in character and manner – did look, feature by feature, very like Hugh. Peter’s influence must come to bear.

  So. Hugh was in all probability Cleopatra’s grandfather and might be handy as a childminder – but something held Muriel back. She wanted nothing to belong jointly to Hugh and herself – not even a grandchild, even if he came in handy. Too underlining.

  Marco bounded off as Phyllis showed delight to see Muriel at a disadvantage again and as Hugh said, ‘Ahem, Muriel. Not my department as you know. You’ve always had a knack with the little ones.’

  Cleopatra was teething and fretful; showing a red blob on one cheek.

  Hugh suggested, ‘Can’t they get an au pair – a Filipino or something?’ Hugh was always ready with long-term solutions but never solved a problem on the spot.

  Muriel, desperate, electric with tension and tired by fighting panic, held tight to the hot baby.

  Once again she told Hugh to stop scouring the teapot whatever else and suggested that he go back to the squash court.

  ‘Not wanted I see, Muriel,’ – tenderly and with eyes again watery. ‘We were happy together, weren’t we?’

  ‘No, Hugh. Never. Never and certainly not now. Buzz off.’ She said ‘Buzz off’ twice – near to losing control. The buzz of Phyllis’s petticoat had reminded her of the sound of the word.

  Placing Cleopatra on the table but keeping an arm around her, with her free hand she pulled a box towards her. Looking into it, she saw two pots of plum jam with shiny transparent paper covering them and banded with elastic. Two pots of ho
ney too. Honey was provided for the house by the unprepossessing Joyce who kept her bees by the greenhouse.

  Phyllis watched with deadly eyes.

  ‘Mr Cottle. Mr Cottle, your husband – not the other one – forgot to take these. I set them aside for him. It’s miserable – what he has to make do with.’

  Muriel seethed. Hugh had been allocated the reasonable rent collected from her London house. Marco and Flavia were given the rent from Peter’s. Both houses were let to young couples who searched to buy their own. Each separate dependant, Hugh and Marco, had, with care, the opportunity to be self-sufficient.

  Cleopatra shunted towards the box and tried to pierce the cellophane with wet fingers.

  ‘Our households, Phyllis, are supposed to be separate.’

  ‘Seems a shame,’ she muttered as she wrenched the parcel from Cleopatra and whirled away with it.

  Muriel, with two biscuits in her pocket and Cleopatra in her arms, walked to the study where Peter wrote verse and where a playpen lived; ready for emergency use.

  Cleopatra, almost immediately, fell asleep; both biscuits wet and crumbling in her hands.

  Muriel sat beside Peter, told him of events, of the scouring, of Cleopatra’s resemblance to Hugh and read the messages on Christmas cards aloud to him. In the main they came from neighbours – angling for an invitation to Bradstow Manor in the New Year.

  ‘Muriel,’ Peter said. ‘There’s no point whatsoever in any of this unless you learn to enjoy it – after all I am here to help you.’

  She softened and was tranquilised.

  The telephone rang on Peter’s desk and Muriel answered it. It was Delilah.

  ‘Muriel! Getting ready for Christmas! Such a busy time. We are all envious of you. I know that envy is a sin but we do envy you your lovely Christmas with your gorgeous little granddaughter. One more thing. Might any of your – er, visitors be in church over the festivities?’

  As Cleopatra, wearing creased pyjamas that nearly burst with heavy nappies, slept on the boards of the playpen, Muriel opened more and more cards.