Tresillick thought of his allotment, lifeless as a desert, the birds pecking on his shrivelled marrows for a morsel of wet. ‘What’s wrong with it?’ he snarled into the face so very close to his.
The windows turned opaque with the steamy breath of a hundred travellers, and wept condensation. It got very hot indeed in the corridor. The oiled aran sweater heated up and loosed acrid, choking fumes reminiscent of a dead sheep. The commuter’s nose gave an unmistakable twitch and his top lip curled. With a disdainful flick of the wrist, he threw up a newspaper between them. It chafed against Tresillick’s wet aran and left it black with newsprint.
The train gave a lurch as it came to a halt in London’s Paddington station, and the girl in the high-heeled shoes stumbled and trod on Tresillick’s foot: spearing it with her heel.
He limped off the train, and felt suddenly like a drunk thrown out of a pub at closing time. For in place of every one suited commuter he could see two, three, four. In place of every one umbrella, a forest of umbrellas. A dozen trains were disgorging identical people, and each had three legs: left, right and umbrella. Tresillick stopped, in sheer panic, at the top of the escalator leading to the Underground. Hosts of men with umbrellas were gliding downwards like the damned trooping down to Hell on Judgement Day. He turned to run, but the crowd was all pressing in one direction. A woman with a suitcase barged him on to the sliding wooden escalator, and there was no escape.
The flood of people washed him into an Underground train, a beast he had never seen before, which writhed its way through the ground like a giant bloodworm and carried Tresillick where he had no wish to go. His eyes ran wildly along the advertisements until a picture of a businessman in suit and bowler hat jeered at him, brandishing an umbrella, telling him to ‘drink Ovaltine every night’.
‘I don’t want to!’ whimpered Tresillick.
The Underground train spat him out at Charing Cross. He climbed up towards the light, but he could not shake off the host of black-suited, three-legged demons who pressed themselves against him, behind and on both sides, with a horrible, indecent intimacy.
Then he was out in the fresh air and the rain. He turned his face towards Heaven and thanked God for the gentle, soothing, cooling drops that splashed across his nose and cheeks and bald, sweating head. He had no idea where he was, but at least he was out in the rainy air!
With a bang that made him cry out with fear, a woman opened a telescopic, automatic umbrella right beside him. ‘A new invention!’ she said, laughing as he staggered sideways. ‘Marvellously handy, aren’t they? Super!’
Around him, the black-suited hordes opened their umbrellas in front of their bodies, like the great round shields of Viking invaders. Tresillick was a Celt once more, a dark-eyed Celtic peasant. Twelve hundred years of history melted away at the sight of those black, domed shields with central spike. A rainy mist blotted out the buildings and left only the giant, primeval River Thames writhing beneath them as the Vikings swept on to Charing Cross Bridge.
There was a wind blowing down the river. It buffeted and pulled at the myriad umbrellas, and the men plunged their bowler-hatted heads deep inside their umbrellas and marched on, blindly. As Tresillick turned to ask directions, the commuter behind pulled his brolly hard down over his head to keep out of the rain. The point of a single spoke sank into the top of Tresillick’s bald head and gouged a tramline in his tender skin.
The pain robbed him of his last remnant of self-control.
He let out a blood-curdling cry and reached up, in self-defence and fury, and took the body of the umbrella and crushed and rended it into a buckled knot of spokes and rags. He snatched the handle out of the owner’s hand and beat the wreckage against the bridge parapet, over and over and over again.
‘I say!’ cried the owner, as the rain pattered for the very first time on his tender bowler hat. He went to the defence of his umbrella because, when he was dressed for the City, it was a part of him as much as a leg or an arm or a nose. He lashed out with his briefcase and knocked Tresillick back against the parapet.
They struggled, they panted, they punched and clinched and rolled, along the metal parapet. The bridge shook as a train trundled across its lattice-work of iron girders. Sleepy commuters looking out through steamy train windows saw the death struggle between Viking and Celt, but had passed by before they could make sense of what they saw. Hurrying commuters on the pedestrian walkways of the bridge skirted nervously round the fight and hurried on. Those who, at the sound of a cry, chanced to look back, saw nothing; nothing but the ugly parapet of the bridge and the swirling misty rain beyond. They shook their heads and thought, ‘Must have been mistaken.’ For who would plunge off Charing Cross Bridge into the icy Thames with a cry of ‘UMBRELLAS!’?
At the inquest, nobody could explain why Dafyd Tresillick should have travelled all the way up from Wales to murder Godfrey Pocock. Pocock was such a mild-mannered man - a bachelor bank manager who had sat at the same desk, day in and day out, for thirty years. Was there a woman involved? Had they been secret partners in crime and fallen out? The newspapers and the police speculated, but nothing was ever decided.
Pocock’s secretary sniffed tearfully as she visited the murdered man’s house. A pang of sentimental pain gripped her heart when she saw the solid, noble umbrella-stand in the corner of the hall. When had she ever seen dear old Mr Pocock without his trusty brolly? She fingered the bentwood curves tenderly, then, briskly blowing her nose, she made an inventory of the house contents and instructed the dealer to sell everything and send the money to Pocock’s brother in Australia.
***
The nun’s purse was open already. ‘Oh the poor man!’ she cried.
‘The innocent victim? Yes indeed,’ said MCC dolefully.
‘No, no! Poor Mr Tresillick! To be vexed with such a temper! Oh it’s a terrible demon to some poor souls not blessed with a peaceful nature. How much is the stand? I’ll take it if it’s not too dear - all supposing you can deliver it for me. Then every time I see it, I’ll be reminded of those two poor men and I can offer up a prayer for them in my heart.’
‘You’d best ask Mr Povey the price,’ said MCC without a trace of rancour. ‘He’s the businessman among us.’
Uncle Clive gave a start, like a stagehand in a theatre who finds the spotlight suddenly shining on him. He made an apologetic grab for his hat and belatedly lifted it to the nun, then clasped it to his chest, moithered with embarrassment. ‘No charge! No charge at all to a lady of your … calling. I’d be honoured if you’d accept it as a gift to the convent. I’ll bring it round myself to you this afternoon. Think nothing of it. Please. Thank you. Yes indeed.’
The little nun, quite overwhelmed with gratitude, passed out through the door as he held it open for her. He bowed as she went by. ‘Oh but that’s a nasty scratch you have there, Mr Povey,’ she said sympathetically, indicating the livid red scrape across the top of Uncle Clive’s shining head.
Ailsa slipped her hand into MCC Berkshire’s.
He squeezed it and said, ‘I’d best be going now.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘You’re not to.’ And when Uncle Clive returned from waving the nun off, Ailsa mustered all her courage and said, ‘I don’t want Mr Berkshire to go, Uncle. The shop’s been much better since he came.’
Uncle Clive still had his hat clasped to his chest, and the other hand rested on the top of his bald head. He shot MCC a look very akin to fear, but avoided the eyes, dangerous and deep as the River Thames. Uncle Clive said in a small, uncertain voice, ‘Oh. Well, lass. That puts a different light on it … I didn’t know the child was fond of him, Audrey. Why didn’t you tell me the lass was fond of him, Audrey? You’d best keep him for a bit. See how things go on.’
‘Yes Clive, all right. If you say so,’ said Mrs Povey. ‘Bring your case up to your room, won’t you?’
‘Oh. Right-o … But I ought to warn you: I can’t stop long. I’m a busy man, you know. Can’t waste much time on social calls.’
‘What a pity,’ said Mrs Povey and Ailsa and MCC, all together.
That afternoon, Mrs Povey sorted MCC’s bookshelves while he was out with Uncle Clive delivering the hat-stand.
‘What are you doing up there. Mother?’ said Ailsa. ‘You know I don’t like you climbing ladders and things.’
Mrs Povey braced herself against the rungs of the step-ladder and steadied with her chin all the romances and love stories she had collected up from the lower shelves. She pushed them one by one into the darkest recesses of the top shelf. Then looking down at her daughter’s upturned face (which was really growing to be very pretty indeed) she said, ‘Don’t get too fond of Mr Berkshire, will you, dear?’
‘Why? Because he lied to that nun? I don’t think it was so dreadful in the circumstances …’
‘No dear. Not because he lied to the nun. I’ve got quite used to MCC’s lies. Just don’t get too fond of him, that’s all.’
‘But why not, Mother?’
‘Don’t argue, Ailsa. There’s a good girl.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE MIRROR:
A STORY OF VANITY
Overnight, Uncle Clive brooded on his generosity to the nun, and the more time passed, the more he regretted it. He slapped down a ten-pound note in front of Mrs Povey at breakfast next morning, though it seemed to cause him physical pain to take his hand away from it. ‘That’s for the coat-stand, Audrey. I won’t see you out of pocket.’
‘Oh there’s really no need, Clive. It was generous of you, and I just hope I’d have done the same thing in your place.’
‘Daresay you would. You’re daft enough. But there’s to be no more of it. I’ve had a look at your accounts, and the place is a shambles. Tuppenny-ha’penny takings. You barely charge more than you pay for a thing! Where’s your profit margin? It’s no good, Audrey. It won’t do. Get on or get out: that’s my motto. Get on or get out.’
His sermon was interrupted by a rattling at the still-locked shop door, and Mrs Povey hurried to let in the first customer, although it was long before nine o’clock. She never turned away trade.
It was a young girl, dressed in the most fashionable, unseasonal clothes - a t-shirt dropping off one shoulder, a tight skirt tapering down to fungussy tights and flat black gym shoes. An encrustation of ugly diamanté jewellery covered her chest, and she wore sunglasses despite the gloom of the late March morning and the interior of the shop. Behind her, down the street, came her elderly parents, stumbling in their hurry to catch up.
Mrs Povey had already opened the door before she noticed MCC’s cricket trousers and green jacket lying neatly across the end of the big brass bedstead and realized that Mr Berkshire was not yet up.
The girl swaggered into the shop past Mrs Povey and roamed about, peering at things through the dense black lenses. She rounded the giant wardrobe and was greeted by the sight of herself in the massive, gilt-framed mirror. As big as a shop window, it all but reached the ceiling, its old, speckled glass supported by ugly cavorting cherubs and badly carved swags of flowers. Grand and tasteless, it had stood in the shop for as long as Ailsa could remember, having its dull gold paint chipped by the more practical furniture which came and went from around it.
The girl stood, hands on hips, admiring her reflection. It took some time to dawn on her that behind her, in the brass-framed bed, a young man reclined on one elbow, reading a novel called Silent Screaming.
‘It’s my birthday,’ she said majestically. He looked up and wished her well of it, then returned to his book. ‘I can have anything I like,’ she bragged. ‘I think I’ll have this.’
Her parents bustled into the shop, breathlessly apologetic for the early hour, and they searched out their daughter. The mother gave a short shriek at the sight of MCC but then, since the young man himself seemed quite undisturbed - as if it were the most common occurrence in the world to sleep in an antique shop - she quickly felt sheepish and silly. ‘Now that’s not very practical is it, my dear?’ she said indulgently to her daughter when she heard about the idea of buying the mirror.
‘I want it. Buy it for me. You said I could choose.’
The girl’s father offered an embarrassed smile to Mrs Povey, Ailsa and Uncle Clive. ‘Once she gets a thing into her head …’ he began to say uneasily.
‘I want it. It’s my birthday, isn’t it? It’s only a paltry mirror. I could ask for something much more expensive.’
‘Yes dear, but
‘I can have it, then?’
‘It’s so big, Angela darling.’
‘And so ugly,’ her mother whispered, not liking to offend the shopkeeper.
‘I think your mother’s right, you know …’ began Mrs Povey.
‘Now Audrey, shut it,’ snapped Uncle Clive. ‘It’s not for us to go poking in our oar.’ (He knew a sure sale when he saw one.)
‘Be sensible, Angela, sweetheart. You don’t want an ugly great thing like that, now do you?’ said the father brusquely, but his voice wavered and Ailsa could read in his grey, seamed face a thousand defeats at the hands of his spoilt daughter.
Angela clenched her fists and turned and beat on the foot of the big brass bed, so that the shop was filled with an eerie, hollow resonance, like tubular bells. ‘You’re cruel and mean and I want it!’
MCC turned over, propped his head on the other hand and went on reading, as if there were no-one but him in the shop. There was a sharp change in flesh colour where the suntan of his arm gave way to the white of his shoulders. He yawned silently. This threw Angela into paroxysms of vexation and, with one eye on the mirror to see the dramatic effect of her tantrum, she hurled herself across the foot of the bed and beat with her fists on the counterpane. MCC drew his legs up out of harm’s way and went on reading. The shop resounded with sobbing and shrieking and accusations and reproaches. ‘I want it! You never give me anything I really want! You’re mean and despicable and I hate you and you’ve ruined my birthday!’
‘What she needs is a good slap,’ muttered Uncle Clive, but broke off at the sight of the father’s wallet being pulled unwillingly out. ‘It’s up to folk how folk ruin their kids,’ he thought, and went searching for a price ticket behind the gilt mirror. Audrey Povey was bound to have priced it too low.
At the sight of her father’s wallet, Angela paused for breath. ‘Well, maybe if her heart’s set on it …’ said the poor father, humiliated and broken in spirit.
At that moment, MCC finished his book and shut it with a snap which made everyone jump. ‘Care to hear a background to the mirror?’ he asked.
‘Not now, lad,’ said Uncle Clive, rather too hastily.
Angela’s mother pursed her lips and eyes to keep back the tears of humiliation, and shook her head. She wanted only to get away as soon as possible.
‘I don’t see how it would help, MCC,’ said Ailsa.
MCC shrugged his white shoulders and leaned forward to ease his crumpled clothing out from under the sprawling Angela.
‘Well I want to hear it,’ said the sulky girl, sitting up and adjusting her pout in the miror. ‘Where does it come from? Whose was it?’
MCC sat back in bed, his hands behind his head. ‘Let me tell you the story,’ he said.
***
Eustacia Dare stood so close to the mirror that her breath made a cloudy patch which obliterated her reflection. She wiped it away impatiently.
‘You’re so beautiful, Eustacia! Marry me or my life is at an end. I shall join the Foreign Legion and hurl my body on to the bayonets of arab tribesmen!’
Eustacia fluttered her eyelids and smiled an enigmatic smile, trying to keep the corners of her mouth from lifting, so as to look like the Mona Lisa.
‘You make a man mad with desire! You make life sweet, but ah, too painful to bear! Won’t you ease my aching heart and say that I may lay my life at your feet, sweetest child of loveliness?’
Eustacia risked a glance upwards through her lashes. Yes. Yes, it came off nicely. The rim of white which show
ed along the bottom lid added an air of doe-like fright to her eyes. If only her breath would not keep steaming up the glass.
‘Oh but surely! The Lady Alice with her cloak of mink and gloves of turquoise expects to be your wife! She is a lady far more befitting your rank and station in life, my lord!’ she whispered, and the girl reflected in the mirror looked oh so heartbreakingly demure and selfless.
‘No, no! I was a fool ever to think I cared for her! It is you! It has always been you, Eustacia Dare! If you will not have me, no-one shall. I shall live a bachelor for as long as my disappointed heart shall beat! Oh spare me my life! Tell me at least that I may hope!’
‘Poor man. Can I hurt you so terribly? My unschooled heart - oh yes, that was excellent, ‘my unschooled heart’ - cannot say whether or not I love you. Nay, perhaps only a kiss shall tell.’
‘You mean …? Can you really mean …? Is it possible that an angel should stoop down from heaven to kiss this worthless lump of clay?’
‘You may. In fact I desire it, Captain!’
Eustacia pursed her lips, closed her eyes and pressed her cheek and mouth in a lingering, rolling motion across the plate glass. Fortunate Captain — to taste a kiss bestowed by the fabulous Eustacia Dare. She thought perhaps he might be struck speechless at this point, and she stepped back from the mirror to admire the overall picture of herself in her party dress of white muslin.
‘Eustacia! Where is that girl? The guests will be arriving!’ A querulous voice climbed its way up through the rambling levels of the house and found her where she stood in her mother’s bedroom, placing her button-booted feet this way and that to find out the best effect.
She picked up the picture hat off the old-fashioned four-poster bed and tied the gauzy sashes under her chin. No. No, it was better off the back of her head, resting on her shoulders, with the curve of the brim surrounding her head like a halo and the white gauze pulled tight across her elegant throat. It looked non-chalant that way — as if she had just run in from the garden, not expecting guests. She pinched her cheek-bones to bring a look of flushed health to the soft, pale skin then, putting on her long, white gloves, she went downstairs for her garden party. It was Eustacia’s birthday.
A Pack of Lies Page 9