Why, oh why, don’t you call me? I would have loved to have you as a house guest and decorated the spare room in pale apricot and cream in the hope that you still might come. I’ve even put a little electric heater in, as it can get chilly at night time.
You might think that I am a trifle unhinged, but, oh Flora, I can never forget your kindness in buying me all those super shoes!
We could have such fun here together and I could cook for you. I am on a low fat diet and have managed to lose three whole pounds in three months – pretty good going I think! And it would be so nice to have someone to share a frozen yoghurt with in the evenings. As well as having someone to go shopping with, oh, there’s so much we could do together! Please do come. Even for a weekend. And please, please write to me. There was so much nonsense in the papers about the house collapsing, you would giggle about it, truly you would! It seems it was a miracle that we weren’t all killed! I ask you! The priest, of course, claimed some sort of higher intervention and is now quite a noise on the TV chat show scene. I was offered of course, but, well, apart from that interview in the magazine, I’ve kept quiet. There’s really very little I could say. I can’t remember most of it anyway. Oh Flora please, please call.
Your loving friend,
Victoria Langley xx
C/O Café Stylianou
Old Port
Skiathos
Greece
Flora,
Apologies for the delay in writing, time and tide and all that. Told young Hal a few things, had your best interests at heart m’dear. Wouldn’t do for you to be tied down by a pup like him. Have been collecting a few marbles myself, it may surprise you to learn (picked up some survivors from a shipwreck, pure nonsense that it put me at any personal risk, don’t believe what you read. I never do.) So might well see you at the Centre. Anyway, business all concluded, many thanks, as usual.
Your friend, Carlton.
The Dolphin and Angel Club
Ship Street
Brighton
Darling Flora,
It was divine to see you albeit far too briefly! I hope you don’t mind but we couldn’t help but notice that a Treatment or two was called for and we’d like to suggest that you come and recuperate here. Of course, you’ve probably had it by now and are swanning around the kasbah somewhere haggling for superb trinkets. Anyway, loads of love,
Candy and Ellie xxxxxxxxxx
P.S. Do try and stop Sylvia writing, there’s a dear. Enough’s enough!
Bella’s Bakery
Cork
Eire
Dear, dear, Flora,
I am sending you the first fruit bun that we have made here, I do so hope that it arrives intact! The most marvellous thing has happened – I got stung by a bee, and nothing, but nothing happened! No swelling, no allergy, nothing! Fiachra says it’s due to a happy married life! But then he would, wouldn’t he?
Also, I don’t know if you’ve seen it, but now I’m a published poet!!! The Cork Bugle printed one of my poems ‘The Bakers Wife’ last week!! How thrilling is that? Fiachra is very proud of me.
Anyway Flora, I truly am so very happy and I know that I have you to thank! Marmaduke loves it here, so many rabbits for him to chase! He’s also got a female admirer, a whippet called Tess.
Please, please come and visit, won’t you? And, if you do come, please bring me a copy of the new Byron biography, won’t you?
Lots and lots of love,
Bella x
P.S. Did you see Father Absolom and Maria on the TV? What a scream! All my customers in the shop are signing up like mad for the courses in self-help through the saints, but then, we are in Cork after all!
P.O Box 121
St John’s Wood
London
If you, like many before you, were touched by the extraordinary events of the house collapse where all miraculously walked away unscathed due to the divine ministrations of Father Absolom and wish to enrol in his life course module ‘Surviving through the Saints!’ or buy any of the literature (£7.99 in p&p) that accompanies this course, please be patient and we will contact you. Due to very high demand we are currently dealing with a large backlog of mail.
Thank you for your continued interest.
Maria Kandinsky (secretary)
Hotel Paradiso
Fariba Islands
Mexico
Flora dear,
Well, it’s been a long four months since we last spoke. I don’t know where to begin, so much has happened! Archie and I are well, though I doubt that you would recognise us! My dear, I’m blonde, two stone lighter and tanned! Archie says I look smashing! He’s mixing some cocktails at the moment for two very sweet American women who are rather keen on tequila. In fact, we’re rather overrun with Americans at the moment, it seems they all read some nonsense about us in an evangelical paper- and voila! So they descend.
Bella’s wedding was gorgeous, thank you so much for her dress, you were quite right about it, and again thank you for Fiachra’s dental work – such an improvement! Too generous of you.
We haven’t managed to see Hal recently but the odd postcards find their way here from strange names like Killaramoo – I think that’s in New Zealand, but I’m not sure, but he seems to be having a super time.
The hotel is proving a doddle to run, and so much fun! I’m so busy running around all day I don’t have a moment to myself and the American women are very demanding - I’m in the middle of re-decorating the poolside villa for John Taylor – he’s promised to come and have a nice long stay here with a dear friend of his that I think you know? Anthony Rockminster? He sounds a perfect duck by the way. Archie is quite the barman and dresses every night in a different local shirt that has flowers or birds printed on it – Hawaiian, I think they’re called, (What will John think of them?!)
Anyway Flora many thanks again.
Fondest wishes,
Sylvia Amble.
P.S. Archie says hello and is asking something about a money transfer? But I’m sure he’ll be in touch himself.
P.P.S. Please tell Ellie and Candy to return my letters, they’d love it over here – many of the American women are quite like them, if you know what I mean!
Postcard franked in Wallahallee, N.Z
Flora,
I was a fool. I turned down the best thing that has ever been offered to me. I must have been blind. If you can ever forgive me, I will spend the rest of my life searching for you. The world is very small, I shall find you.
Hal
Hotel Paradiso
Fariba Islands
Mexico
Dear Flora,
Don’t mind admitting I’m getting a little edgy. Third time I’ve written to you and no reply yet! Just in case you’ve not received my previous letters (and judging by the shower that runs the mail service here I wouldn’t be at all surprised!) I’ll give you my details again.
A.Amble
A/C no 1765 9808 9873 2214
National Bank of Mexico
Damned hot here and need the money to install some decent air conditioning, also, wouldn’t mind a little motor boat for dodging around the islands. V.flat sea here – no chance of mal de mer!
Look forward to hearing from you soon.
All the best,
Archie Amble
Hotel Paradiso
Fariba Islands
Mexico
My Dear Woman,
Are you completely insane? I have never been so astounded in all my life! I eventually hear from you and instead of opening a letter that contains my money – what do I get ? a bill! NINE pages of barely legible scrawl in green ink! Green, I ask you! Let me tell you right now that this will never stand up in a court of law, any court, as I see from your post box address that you are hiding in that most craven of countries – namely Switzerland. Even the secret gnomes of Zurich won’t come to your aid Flora, let me assure you! That money is rightfully mine – and as for this trumped up bill – the whole thing is ridiculous.
£200,000 for ‘making me aware of how much I loathed my job and Sir George’
£500 for ‘making me breakfast when I was still under the influence’
£100,000 for ‘making Hal a man instead of an awkward boy’
£100,000 for ‘introducing Bella to happiness’
What ?? Incredible!
I could go on and on but I fear my temper will not allow me to. The whole thing is ludicrous. Ridiculous. And, illegal. As for the preposterous idea that you can claim £500,000 for the commission on the sale of the house – well! Common decency prevents me from continuing. With your absurd reckoning I see that the final amount that I am due is £122.95.
I am speechless with horror.
I shall expect my money within seven days. The full amount. Or you shall be hearing from my lawyers.
Archibald Amble
Hotel Paradiso
Fariba Islands
Mexico
Dear Flora,
Archie is unable to write as he is laid low with a cold (would you believe it possible to have a cold in temperatures like this?) Well, he says it’s a cold, but he really is behaving very strangely, but I put that down to being a man, you know how they get when they are a little unwell. He’s probably got a slight chill from all that midnight bathing he does! (Not to mention the tequila cocktails!) So he’s sulking in his room with the shutters closed and a jug of iced water – on a lovely day like this, too!
Anyway, he’s most anxious about some sort of cheque or something and asked me to write – I honestly don’t really know what he’s fussing about as I seem to have much more money in my account (I took your advice after all and quite agree with your views about joint accounts!) that we really need.
So don’t worry about it Flora, I hope you’re having a simply marvellous time, wherever you are. Don’t completely forget us, will you?
Yours fondly,
Sylvia Amble.
P.S. John Taylor and Anthony send their love, we’re having a lobster BBQ tonight – how I wish you were here!
P.P.S. I do wish you’d write Flora, I never really know if you get these letters, and to that end I shall communicate no more till I hear from you. But please remember you will always be welcome here.
Agenelli’s
Ponte Vecchio
Fiorenze
Dearest Mrs Tate,
A million thanks for your order.
We are happy to be sending you the fine, most marvellous, superb gold and onyx marble of our entire collection. He has no flaws and is most opulent. We think he is from the 17th century and will be most treasured by you.
We await to see your face in our shop with pleasurable anticipation.
Safe journeying and happy life.
S, Angnelli.
If you enjoyed reading Before and After you may be interested in The Cornish Affair by Laura Lockington also published by Endeavour Press.
Extract from The Cornish Affair by Laura Lockington
Chapter One
I think I’d better get the explanation of my name over and done with now. It can lead to false impressions. People do tend to jump to the conclusion that I’m Irish. I freely admit that my name has a Gaelic aroma to it, a whiff of windy beaches and stormy seas, but, it isn’t. I am called Finisterre because I was conceived, very unromantically, in my opinion, whilst my parents were listening to the BBC shipping forecast. I also am very fair skinned, prone to freckles in the summer and have unruly curly hair. Chestnut coloured, not auburn, as I insist on saying.
It would have been cold comfort to both of them had they known that many years later Finisterre had been summarily dismissed and was re-named FitzRoy. I suppose I should just be thankful that I wasn’t christened Doggerbank or Viking.
Most people call me Fin.
When I reached an age to discuss sex with my parents, if indeed any of us actually ever do reach that stage, and ask them how they knew this, it was too late. They both died in a very untimely car crash whilst motoring through a thick fog on the M5.
It was too bad. I had a trunkful of unanswered questions. Like, how exactly did they know when I was conceived? Was it because they made love so seldom? Or was it such a spectacular climax? My mother had admitted that she felt a ‘ping’ deep inside her, but she was prone to terrible exaggeration and it had crossed her mind that it had in fact been a snapped suspender. Oh, and the big question of course, like, how the hell was I meant to carry on without them?
I inherited my father’s green eyes, determination, and Penmorah House, perched on the top of a cliff at about the furthest west you can get in England without toppling into the sea. A collection of pre-war silk stockings from my mother who along with an almost theatrical inclination to embroider day to day life had an obsession with vintage underwear. My father’s cellar full of claret (undrinkable) and a simply terrifyingly large debt. Oh, yes, and Nelson, of course.
Luckily, very luckily I had climbed out of the hell which is financial chaos and was beginning to reap the rewards of some hard work. There were very few things that I was talented with – but the marrying of flavours was one of, well, my only if I’m going to be strictly honest, talents.
I invent soup. I am England’s leading soupologist.
What on earth do you mean you’ve never heard of it?
Do you really think that the carton of Thai spinach and lemongrass soup sitting in your fridge just sort of evolved overnight? No. It didn’t. And, I am happy to tell you, there wasn’t a committee of little men in white coats bubbling things up in test tubes in a factory either.
Of course I didn’t just do soups. What’s your favourite sarnie from the huge chain of shops that we all are meant to buy our knickers from? Well, that was probably one of mine, too. Sauces, pies, pasta dishes, practically anything that you grab from a chill cabinet in your local supermarket is mine.
And please, I beg you, don’t get me started on junk food. My job or calling if you like, is only tenable here in England or possibly America by the seeming inability of anyone to throw together a simple meal. That and the death of markets such as every tiny European town could, and thank the Lord, still does have. Most towns in England now don’t even have a fishmonger, let alone a delicatessen. Oh, I know, I know, if you live in the heart of Soho or are lucky enough to personally know a fisherman you might get the goods, but otherwise, at any one time of your life, you’ll be eating one of my concoctions.
It was all down to me.
Me and the boys, of course.
I lifted my head slightly from where I’m sitting and I saw one of them puttering up the lane and into the drive in a disgracefully dilapidated 2CV van, you know, the ones that really do look like a squashed sardine tin on wheels, it has a sticker on the back that proclaimed ‘Windsurfers Do It Standing Up’. This particular boy is Jason Patrick Rasheed Rampersaud, known by all locally as Jace the Onion. He’s passing through the steeply banked, damp, lane that soon will be sprouting purple foxgloves and are studded with wild garlic and vetch. He swung the van round on the gravel to the side of the house, and gave a toot to let me know he’s here.
I pushed open the kitchen door for him letting in a whoosh of salty air and he swaggered in with a crate of his namesake. He’s a breathtakingly beautiful boy with a skin the colour of a good Colombian roast coffee and a gleaming head of shoulder length blackberry coloured hair. I know it’s blackberry, because he enthusiastically pointed the packet out to me in his shopping basket once when I bumped into him in Boots in Truro. “Because you’re worth it,” I’d said to him.
Today his hair is tied back with a piece of red nylon that on closer inspection is a coloured pop sock, undoubtedly still warm from one of his many conquests.
He casually slid the crate of onions onto the table, and leant back, with folded arms.
“Mornin’ Fin, where’s the little bastard then?”
I glanced over to Nelson, who is watching
morosely from his perch in the corner of the kitchen, his red and green feathers huddled around him like a ruffled fur coat. I’m slightly nervous, because even the name of the dog, can give Nelson the jitters. And no, before you should ask, the dog’s name was in fact Baxter. But Nelson hates him. I thought that it was a fleeting thing, but oh no. I’d had the dog for eighteen months now and they did not get on. It was like trying to live with two rival delinquent football supporters.
“Jace, please don’t call him that. You know what Nelson’s like,” I said.
We both glanced over to him, but Nelson shuffled his feet around for a bit and then tucked his head under his wing.
“Anyway, Nancy’s taken him for a walk.”
I went over to the crate and poked the onions. They were pearly white, and individually wrapped in straw.
Jace lolled over to the kettle and switched it on.
“Thirsty work, humpin’ onions,” he remarked.
If I knew Jace, that wasn’t the only thing he’d been humping. But I kept the thought to myself. I made some tea and we chatted for a while about the surf at Newquay, the beach picnic that was planned, and all the usual local gossip, including the thrilling topic of the moment which was a lorry which had overturned on a narrow bridge down in Dunmere that was carrying full consignment of men’s shoes. By the time the lorry driver had climbed out of his cab and hiked to a call box and returned, the lorry was empty. According to Jace every Tom Dick and Harry was to be seen sporting gleaming new footwear, swearing that they had picked them up for a song at Trego Mills.
This was definitely a county that still had wreckers in the blood.
What had puzzled the poor lorry driver was that the stretch of road had been deserted, and he couldn’t figure out where the looters had come from.
“But then, he was from up country,” Jace said dismissively, with a lazy smile.
Up country could of course mean anything, but just not Cornish. It could even mean from (Lord preserve us) Devon. I smiled and looked down. Sure enough, a very snazzy pair of what looked like Italian loafers were on his feet.
Before and After Page 26