The Second Life of Sally Mottram

by David Nobbs

  ‘You can say what you like. Dun’t have to be true.’

  But it did. She was too nervous even to be able to think up a fictional breakfast.

  ‘Oh yes. I had muesli. With raspberries and blueberries.’

  ‘Thank you. That’s fine. Just getting a level.’

  The memory of breakfast with Barry flashed through her mind. He’d been grumpy in the mornings, and very conservative. She wouldn’t have dared have muesli with raspberries and blueberries and face his sarcasm, his hunger for ‘a real breakfast’, as if muesli was just a story. And she’d gone along with it! She’d been a mouse. How could she think she could carry this off tonight? The thought of his being there, listening, almost knocked her off her feet, and then she had a very strange thought. She wished the driver of that dreadful lorry, the man who hadn’t raped her, could see her now, in all her … in all her what? Her glory? Come off it, Sally. But she so wished that she had thanked him. Not for not raping her. For saving her life. She really believed that was what he had done. She should have tried to find him, to thank him and apologize for thinking such awful thoughts about him. She should have trusted him. She would be helping, starting here tonight, to build a more trustworthy world. World? No, Sally, don’t get carried away. A more trustworthy Potherthwaite.

  Even that was hubris. The unlovely room with its high windows stared back at her without expression. There were rows and rows of empty chairs, ugly chairs which would, she was certain, remain empty. How could she ever have thought that she, the lawyer’s widow, could command a stage of this size?

  Her triumph at the Weavers’ Arms meant nothing now. She realized that each triumph would simply make the next speech harder.

  There had been notices about the meeting in every public place. ‘The FUTURE of YOUR Town is in YOUR Hands’. Sally, Marigold, Harry and Jill had called on virtually every house, asking people to come and debate the town’s future. Sally had found it hard going, although most people had been reasonably courteous. But almost everybody asked who they were doing it for – which political party, which think tank, what special-interest group – and where the money would be coming from. It seemed impossible for people to believe that they were ordinary unpaid citizens who simply cared about the future of their town and, almost incidentally, of the world. If everyone who had expressed an interest turned up, there wouldn’t be room, but Sally felt in her quivering heart that there would be room and chairs to spare.

  Marigold was the first to arrive. She was wearing a black dress patterned with scarlet roses. Her spectacular jade earrings had been a birthday present from Timothy in the early, generous years. She was showing far too much cleavage for a church hall. Sally liked her and needed her, but she felt a spasm of irritation now. It was her evening, not Marigold’s. Nor did Marigold’s opening remark please her.

  ‘Nobody here yet, then?’

  ‘Thank you, Marigold.’

  ‘Oh, Sally, don’t worry. I’ve had heaps of promises.’

  ‘Promises!’

  Marigold hugged her. Five different scents wafted around Sally. She must have been a little allergic to one of them, and had a coughing fit, choked, thought she was going to die, almost wished she could. Marigold banged her on the back and said, ‘Take short breaths. Short breaths.’ Desperately she took short breaths. The moment passed.

  The next to arrive was the Revd Dominic Otley. He always carried his head to the left, as if there was somebody shorter there whose pearls of wisdom he needed to hear. He looked around the unlovely room and said, ‘To think that this room is where it’s all starting.’

  Sally looked at him in astonishment.

  ‘What’s all starting?’

  ‘My dear lady! This! All this! You! Transition. The Transition of Potherthwaite. Not nervous, are you? Well, I suppose you’re bound to be.’ He lowered his voice. ‘I threw up before my first sermon.’

  That makes a change, thought Sally uncharitably. I feel like throwing up during your sermons. The sermon was not the strongest part of a Revd Otley service.

  Arthur and Jessica Frond entered, and looked round the hall uncertainly. Sally had a fear that when they saw that there were only two other people they would leave. Arthur had aged. He had never been the same man after Willis & Frond folded. He shouldn’t have stayed on in the town that had once looked up to him.

  But they didn’t leave. They stood, in the chronic indecision of age, for quite a while, unable to decide which of two hundred and forty-six chairs to sit in. At last they chose two chairs right on the edge, in case they needed the lavatory or were utterly bored.

  Nobody came in for another two or three dreadful, endless minutes. Arthur and Jessica Frond smiled bravely, covering their embarrassment.

  Then Peter and Myfanwy Sparling entered. Sally was pleased and touched to see them. They came over to her, smiling, and both kissed her.

  ‘That evening, Sally, when it … you know … happened …’ said Peter Sparling.

  ‘Don’t remind her, Peter,’ said Myfanwy. ‘She won’t want to be reminded, not tonight.’

  ‘No, but I mean, that evening, and this, who’d have thought it? Marvellous. Marvellous, Sally.’

  Peter Sparling pumped her hand, and she suddenly wanted to cry, had to fight the tears off. Waves of emotion came over her – she didn’t know what half of them were about, and she fought them off desperately.

  The Hammonds had sent a note. ‘Good luck, will raise a glass to you in Tenerife.’ That was nice of them.

  A few more people entered. Jill and Harry as expected. ‘Couldn’t persuade the others. Silly sods.’ Rog and Sue from the Weavers’ Arms. ‘We’ll never forget it started in our pub.’ Sophie Partington, the town’s one-woman red-light district. Dr Ian Mallet. ‘My wife is uneasy in crowds. Claustrophobia, you know.’ Then analyse her and cure her, man. Councillor Frank Stratton – good! good! – with his wife Marian. Gordon Hendrie and his wife Jenny, parents of Potherthwaite’s most famous daughter, Potherthwaite’s only famous daughter, Arabella Kate Hendrie, the opera star.

  ‘Arabella is singing at La Scala tonight,’ said Gordon in a low boom.

  ‘Singing for you,’ squeaked Jenny in her tiny voice.

  Sally reflected on the improbability of Gordon and Jenny’s voices having combined to produce the voice of a young woman sometimes referred to as ‘the Yorkshire Callas’.

  ‘For me?’ she asked.

  ‘For you.’

  ‘For Potherthwaite. She asked us to tell you.’

  ‘She’ll be singing at La Scala, for Potherthwaite.’

  ‘Well, that’s … that’s amazing.’

  And it was. Sally felt really moved.

  Gloria Wells from the better of the nearly-new shops, but there was nothing even nearly new about her. That strange boy Ben with his friend Tricksy. How wonderful to have youngsters there. Jill was talking to Harry and he was laughing. Sally wondered what she was saying to amuse him so. Actually, it was perhaps as well that she didn’t know. Jill was saying, ‘You see the man on my left. I’ve given him two endoscopies, a colonoscopy and a sigmoidoscopy. I know his intestines better than I know the Pennines.’

  Now they were pouring in. Quite a few people had been wandering around in the Market Place, looking round to see if enough people were coming to make it worth coming. Now they too came in. Four of the people who had heard Sally speak in the Weavers’ Arms were there, plus representatives of groups with special interests. There were people whose names she didn’t know and people whose names she had forgotten, including Long Raincoat – where had she met him?

  There weren’t even going to be enough seats. Extra chairs were being fetched. This was massive.

  Sally was surprised to see Matt Winkle, the supermarket manager, accompanied by his gaunt wife, Nicola, who was from a good family and embarrassed Matt by buying her food at the butcher’s and the deli. He was about to sit next to Sophie Partington, but Nicola pulled him away and led him to the other side of the central
gangway. Every choice of seat has significance in a small community. Every choice of seat is a little drama in itself.

  At last it was time to start. The vicar had offered to introduce Sally, ‘it being the church hall’, and nobody had known how to refuse.

  He strode to the lectern placed in the middle of the stage. Sally hovered at the back of the stage, her heart pumping.

  ‘Good evening,’ he began. ‘How I wish that I could get an audience like this for …’

  He paused. Sally’s stomach muscles tightened and she cringed. That would have been better left unsaid, like much that the Revd Dominic Otley said.

  ‘… my little events next door.’

  Sally feared that the vicar expected at least a titter here.

  ‘We all know why we’re here …’

  So don’t tell us, please.

  ‘We are here to listen to Sally Mottram, a … um … a most remarkable woman …’

  Please. Don’t.

  ‘… a quite extraordinary woman …’

  All eyes on her. How could she react? Agreement was impossible, denial would be ridiculous.

  ‘… who has faced … um … misfortune with … um … courage and fortitude.’

  The unnecessary nouns thudded round the hall like gunshot.

  ‘We all know, I think, that Sally is proposing huge changes here in our little town. I believe in tradition, as I’m sure many of you know, but with tradition there must come change.’

  He was in full sermon mode. Sally had a terrible fear that he would do his usual seventeen or so minutes.

  ‘Change and tradition are the … um … the … um … the … um … the bedrock … um …’

  Suddenly the Revd Otley realized what he was doing, and stopped.

  ‘But you haven’t come here to hear me,’ he said. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to introduce a lady many of us know and all of us admire, Mrs Sally Mottram.’

  Sally stepped forward. There was loud applause. She was shaking. She wouldn’t be able to use her notes until she stopped shaking. All afternoon she had been reminding herself to remind herself tonight of the advice she had been given by Councillor Frank Stratton. She remembered to remind herself of it now. ‘Your whole being will urge you to hurry. Resist it. Slow down. If ever you feel the urge to hurry, slow down.’

  She waited, and waited, until there was total silence. This gave at least the illusion that she was in control.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen …’

  Her voice didn’t sound as nervous as she had feared, and suddenly she was thinking not of herself, but of Potherthwaite.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I am so thrilled to see so many of you here this evening. Thank you so much for coming.’

  She paused, raised her voice.

  ‘I have a vision for this town.’

  The word ‘vision’ had come from nowhere, fought its way in. It frightened her.

  ‘Not that I have any intention of forcing any vision of mine on you. Regard it as just a starting point.’

  No, Sally. Too negative. Too modest. She needed her notes. If only her hands weren’t shaking.

  ‘My house is up for sale, and I fully intended, when I found a buyer, to go back south. I found that I couldn’t. I found that I love this town. I believe it has enormous potential.’

  She was trying not to notice anybody in particular in the audience. She was trying to see them as a blur. But she caught sight of Katherine Kavanagh, from the Kosy Korner Kafé, and found herself thinking how good it was of her to come. No, Sally. Fatal. Concentrate.

  She started to talk about climate change.

  ‘Some people argue that the case for climate change is unproven. Others say that while the case is proven, it is not necessarily man-made.’

  Her voice was quivering. She caught sight of Terence and Felicity Porchester, trapped on their narrowboat at the silted Quays. What she said could help to release them. They were lovely people. She wanted to release them. She had paused for too long, but now she had a sense of purpose and suddenly her hands weren’t shaking. She also realized that she didn’t need her notes any more. It was a miracle. She had been silent for too long. Say something, Sally, quickly. But say what?

  Say that, Sally. Be human.

  ‘I have my notes here. I haven’t been able to use them, because my hands have been shaking too much, and I didn’t want you to see how nervous I am. And, do you know, I find I don’t even need those notes. I will speak from the heart.’

  A few people clapped and on hearing them clapping a few others joined in. It wasn’t much, but it was encouraging.

  ‘I say that most if not all of the things man needs to do to combat climate change are things that are good in themselves, so let’s stop arguing and start acting. To wait for incontrovertible proof would be the most ludicrous risk.

  ‘Just as important as climate change is peak oil, yet this is an issue that is hardly mentioned in our petrol-guzzling world, because we are so terrified of it. What does it mean? It is a name for the moment when the amount of oil available in the world becomes less by the day rather than more. Oil is finite. It will run out, unless we use less. A lot less. A whole lot less. Or find alternative sources of energy. But we cannot rely on that. We must use less oil.’

  These were powerful words. Sally paused, calming herself down. From the corner of her eye she caught sight of one of the doctors from the Baggit View Surgery whispering to a colleague. She imagined that he was making some highly intelligent, pertinent comment. Luckily she couldn’t hear him. He was actually saying, ‘Look at that Boyce-Willoughby woman’s tits. How could three husbands have walked out on her? Where did she find them? St Dunstan’s?’

  ‘There are people in Oxford Road, where I live, thoroughly nice people,’ continued Sally, ‘who take their families to Portugal four times a year. They are helping to poison the world. There may still be fuel for their children and their children’s children to take their families to Portugal, but will there be fuel for their grandchildren’s children? I think not … unless we change.’

  Sally had almost shouted those last three words.

  ‘This is where I turn to our own little world,’ she said in a softer voice. ‘We in our little way here cannot act on a world stage, but as it happens there are plans afoot for Potherthwaite’s future and there are alternatives which will help us to fight these great threats to the world and also improve our town. This is where the global and the local come together. I will tell you how I hope to persuade you to fight these plans.’

  Her eyes swung towards Councillor Frank Stratton. She couldn’t stop them. He was tense, and he was frowning. She didn’t mind that she had caught his eye. In that moment she felt strong enough, with the town behind her, to fight.

  ‘I said, when I spoke to a few of you at the Weavers’ Arms – and I’m happy to see that one or two of the people who heard me then at the neighbouring tables didn’t feel I’d ruined their meal, they’re here tonight.’

  There was applause. She smiled. She was beginning to enjoy herself, she really was.

  ‘I said then that I have a plan. I’d better tell you what it is. I’ve spotted two or three councillors here tonight, and you’ll think, What a cheek, is this woman a town planner? No, I’m not, but I find that I’m something perhaps even more important than a town planner. I’m a town dreamer. I’m a dream maker, and my dream is this. There is a plan for a second supermarket in the town, on the waste ground in the High Street, and this plan involves destroying the Potherthwaite deli. I’m not against destroying the deli …’

  There were murmurs of surprise. She held her hand up.

  ‘… because we don’t use it enough. But of course I have a solution for that. Use it. Use it or lose it.’

  Her eyes strayed to Matt and Nicola, Nicola giving Matt a smile with cold triumph but no humour in it. Look away, Sally. Don’t let your concentration be broken again.

  ‘And with my plan you will not need to lose it. Keep the deli
and all the other small shops and use them.’

  There was loud applause.

  ‘Applause is not enough.’

  She dared to glare at them for a moment, and she felt, for the first time, something that she knew to be very dangerous indeed. She felt, in a small but deeply beguiling way, the excitement of power.

  ‘Now, my plan. I turn to the roads. We have a plan for a new road to the south of the town, turning right to feed the new supermarket. I suggest that it won’t cost a great deal more if this road doesn’t turn right, that there is no second supermarket, that it goes straight on and joins the existing road at the roundabout before the allotments. What will we have produced then? A bypass.’

  There was more applause.

  ‘Imagine if the High Street was pedestrianized.’

  There was yet more applause.

  ‘Yes, ladies and gentlemen of the council, I know I am not a member of the Highways Department or the Highways Committee, but my plan makes sense. The only thing I haven’t mentioned is the open space. I know that we have a park, a rather large but also rather featureless park, on the outskirts of town. What about another park here, small but elegant, right in the middle of town. I even have a name for it. Central Park.’

  Again, the audience applauded.

  ‘Potherthwaite, the New York of the Pennines.’

  Don’t get carried away, Sally, or you will be carried away.

  She paused, calming herself down. When she had calmed herself down, when she felt certain that she wouldn’t make grandiose promises that she couldn’t fulfil, Sally spoke in a lower, softer voice.

  ‘I don’t want this to be a one-person campaign. I just want to set it in motion and let you, the people of Potherthwaite, take it from there. I can only do so much, but I make you one promise. I’m not a miracle worker, I leave that side of things to the vicar …’

  There was some laughter at the thought of the Revd Dominic Otley performing any kind of miracle. The vicar himself smiled rather grimly.

  ‘… but some of you may know that I am friendly with a lady in the town who is well known for all the wrong reasons. My plans for her are also my plans for all of us. With our marvellous allotments fully used, with local food shops in the High Street, Potherthwaite can eat locally and healthily. I didn’t know what permaculture meant until I read the Transition books. It’s an ugly word for a beautiful concept, the development of agricultural ecosystems that are sustainable and self-sufficient. We will set up our permaculture here, and its symbol will be the lady of whom I speak. It has been said, though it has not been confirmed, that she is the fattest woman in Yorkshire. I refer of course to Ellie Fazackerly. I have a dream for Ellie. She knows of it and she knows that I am telling you this tonight and at this very moment, trapped in her great bed, she will be dreaming of it too. My dream is that one summer’s day, in the not-too-distant future, when the canal has been dredged by volunteers – and that means us. I have to tell you that none of you are just here to applaud. Sorry about that …’