by Mavis Cheek
He moved off. Gwen gone into the town. He'd miss her. Red as the haws she went that first time. Eager red, while he did the unbuttoning...
He looked back at the bare legs of the girls as they sat on the well. At their arms naked, at their throats all exposed. Thigh tops. Thin. And he was unmoved. No mystery, women nowadays. That day, just the size of her under her skirt made him hot. You wouldn't get a handful now. And pigs, nowadays, they were thin too. Thin girls, thin sows. Not bred to it now, not the pigs, not the women. Not bred for work or love.
After he had gone Angela said, much amused, 'Sam must be very shocked by us. I mean, Mrs Perry was so upright and proper and just - well-good. Like a big unshakeable tree. And here we are, half dressed and probably turning him on. Poor old thing.'
Daphne nodded. 'She wouldn't have been seen dead in shorts. Not even in the hottest weather. Imagine being covered all the time, knee to hem.'
'Not very sexy.'
'Not very sexy,' Daphne agreed. 'On the other hand, I don't suppose a proper woman like her thought very much about sex. It was just another part of rural married life. A necessity that brought them children. Orgasms were not the common fruit, then.'
Angela kept silent. They weren't exactly the most obvious delicacy around now. 'Talking of fruit,' she said eventually, 'I'm not making mulberry wine but I am going to make ale.'
Daphne smiled back. 'Of course, the ale-wife’ she said. 'The ale-wife was often known for brewing more than just good beer. She could be quite accommodating to the men who drank it.'
'Not this one,' laughed Angela a little wistfully. 'Well, not yet anyway.'
'Has Craig tried it on with you yet?' asked Daphne. Angela felt herself go red as a berry. 'Certainly not,' she said. 'Poor Lucy,' said Daphne.
'Yes,' said Angela, 'she could do with a replacement.'
'Maybe,' said Daphne, rinsing the last of the finds. 'But I think she really loves him.'
'Oh, Daphne,' said Angela, ‘I mean the au pair.'
They emptied the bucket and put in all the washed items. Small and inconsequential as they once were, they looked interesting in a heap.
Daphne went back to the church and Angela went down to the hens.
Some jobs were eternal. Like shovelling shit. She hoped very much, and metaphorically speaking, that it was a similar activity engaging the current Mrs Fytton right now. Wedding anniversary indeed, she thought - wedding anniversary -shovel, shovel, shovel.
Ian managed to calm his hissing, spitting wife by promising to telephone their absent mother.
'It's either them or me,' said Binnie, who had grown an aura of steel around her that would not have disgraced Joan of Arc.
'I agree. I absolutely agree. I'll do it now.'
From the bathroom above their heads could be heard the sound of something violent occurring in the digestive department. The teenaged hangovers were going apace.
Binnie was off up the stairs like Joan after the English. 'In my bloody bathroom again’ she yelled.
Ian sat down at the kitchen table, feeling weak and lost. In front of him, swilling around in various unmentionable substances on the table, was a postcard, which was largely indecipherable save for the words 'Am so enjoying... Fytton honey... Sammy is wonderful.' For a moment he looked at it quite fondly. Then his expression changed. He threw it in the rubbish bin, pushing it down among the cans. She knew very well it drove Binnie mad that she still used his name.
He went to pour himself a whisky before making the call. He needed something to calm him. He opened the cupboard. 'That too?' he whispered at the Famous Grouse. A sentiment which was echoed when he searched further, only this time it was to his beloved, wholly absent, Glenmorangie.
As Angela walked back from collecting her hops, the clouds began to assemble. Dave the Bread passed her in his van. She waved, but for some reason he looked at her nervously, waved back and accelerated. A piece of paper fluttered behind the van which she thought might have come from its open window. She chased it. It came to rest on the hedge of hazel and cotoneaster that surrounded the Tichbornes' garden. It looked like a wrapper from something, but as soon as she tried to grasp it, the wind came and caught it and whirled it up, over the garden hedge and off somewhere out of sight.
Above her head the first thunder rumbled and a spike of lightning threatened to tear the heavens apart. The air was heavy and the edge of it chill. She hurried home as the first leaden droplets began to fall.
Had she not stopped to catch the wrapper, she might have reached home in time to answer the telephone. But even as she bashed at her door with her hip, another tremendous splice of lightning broke the air, followed by a crash of thunder. There was much fury in the heavens. A lot of it seemed to be directed towards the telecommunications system in the west of England, for Angela Fytton's telephone, along with those of others around about, ceased to function. When Ian tried her again, in that vital five minutes' time, the lines were all dead, dead, dead.
Not that Angela Fytton was aware of this. She merely turned up the Aga, put on a jumper and some leggings, and sat sipping a little glass of port by the heat of the stove. Later she would make a list of all the items needed for the ale. There was much to do both indoors and out before the winter settled upon her. She strung the hops from the beams, looping them over old hooks and nails that had been there for - she was certain - generations. As they warmed themselves, they gave off a tantalizing scent, so they were quite, quite ready.
But Angela Fytton was not. .. Quite. One thing at a time, she thought happily, putting her feet up on the Aga.
Sip, sip, sip.
'The lines are all down’ said Ian. 'From storms’ 'Good’ said Binnie. 'Then maybe she's dead.' 'Oh, now wait a minute...' This was the mother of his children of whom she spoke, after all. He looked at his current wife in a new and somewhat unappetizing light. He could wish Angela to Timbuktu on a bed of pins, but he wouldn't want her dying of it.
'Plan A, Ian,' said Belinda, tapping her little foot dangerously. 'Plan A. Send them down to their mother's tomorrow..!
He put the Plan A to Andrew and Claire. Andrew and Claire said no. They said he was a bad father for wanting to send them somewhere so remote that the telephone didn't work. Somewhere away from all their friends. He heard them on the telephone in the hallway telling one of their friends that they were being threatened with exile. It not only sounded bad. He felt bad. He remembered his own youth. He had given parties when he was not supposed. It was all part of the pattern of growing up. True, he had not vomited all over his parents' en-suite, or piddled in his parents' double-drainer, but that was only because they did not have such things. He did not want to drive a wedge between himself and his children like their mother had done. He enjoyed having them on his side. It made up for the guilt. Perhaps they could stay if they promised to behave ... A party - after all, what was a party?
And then Binnie rang the Christian Trisha. After which Binnie's scream of rage again awoke her sleeping infant.
Exile did seem to be the only answer. But maybe somewhere they would actually like to go... Not a wholly punishing exile. For had not they, through his little iniquity with Binnie, been punished enough? Maybe there was a different kind of exile. Much further away.
He remembered the last time they had all been so happy together. And then he had a masterplan. Somerset was very close to London. Even if he persuaded his ex-wife to take the children, there was no certainty they would stay taken.
'Binnie,' he said, holding her close. She felt like a cocked gun. 'Darling. I've had an even better idea. We'll send them on a trip to Australia. They loved it before. They'll love it again. It's their gap year. In a gap year you are supposed to expand your horizons. So they can go and expand them in Australia’
'Won't that be expensive?'
'Not if they get a job each out there.'
She was mollified.
'When?'
'As soon as it can be arranged. I'll ask Moneypenny.' Tomorrow?'
>
'Well, I think that's a bit soon really. Er, I -'
'Not the trip,' she snapped, in a way she had never snapped before. 'Moneypenny’
By his first wedding anniversary, it occurred to Ian Fytton that the honeymoon was, indeed, all over.
18
November
Clothing was manufactured largely by female labour. Linen sheets, pillow covers, bed hangings, cushions, napkins and tablecloths represented the accumulated labour of generations of women, and, if handled carefully, could be passed on from one generation to another.
sara mendelsohn and patricia crawford,
Women in Early Modern
England Pray, good people, be civil. I am the Protestant whore.
nell gwynn, to a hostile crowd that mistook her for the catholic duchess of portland
It rained, as Sam Lee had predicted, for days. And Angela's back did not respond well in the dampness. How, wondered Angela, had Tess Durbeyfield dug for turnips all day long and not died of it? Then she remembered. Tess Durbeyfield more or less did. It occurred to her that she was not getting any younger and that these were the very dreadful givers-away of age . . . twinges. She copied out Maria Brydges's recipe, put on her waterproofs and went squelching over to ask Wanda about the lavender back-rub. Sammy might not approve of Wanda, for whatever reason, but she did.
She rapped at the knocker of Tally-Ho Cottage confidently. At least she had real business to attend to. Not time-wasting. And she would surely not be kept on the doorstep in this weather.
Wanda opened the door. Just a crack. 'Come on, Wanda,' she said, smiling gamely. 'Let me in. I know all about your secrets.' Wanda, she felt, was a woman not blessed with a profound sense of humour. Indeed, just for a moment she looked as if she might topple over with misery. Not one for badinage, then, thought Angela. She changed to a suitable gravitas and followed her into the kitchen of Tally-Ho Cottage very meekly, as if she was treading on holy ground. A loom, vats of colour, drying garments, the smell of cinnamon, assorted coloured candles in the making. A hive of decent industry, yet picturesque as a stage set.
She handed Wanda the recipe.
'I wondered if you could make this up for me?'
Wanda squeaked something about being very busy.
'I can see that,' said Angela, trying to look round her hostess, who seemed determined she should not. 'But I'd be really grateful. Next year, of course, I shall have my own herb beds, but in the meantime...'
Wanda was staring at the paper. If she had looked in low spirits before, she was now looking seriously miserable.
Angela gave her another smile to buck her up. But Wanda did not buck up.
Why was this?
This was because Wanda was thinking, What the fuck is a drachm? And, I have no scruples...
'It was all that digging that brought on the back. Still - no reward without effort . . .' Angela touched one of the garments hanging to dry. 'You are clever’ she said. 'And it must feel very rewarding.'
Wanda continued to stand there looking miserably mesmerized. Angela had clearly disturbed her working day.
'Sorry’ she said. ‘I’ll be off.'
Wanda opened the door with, in Angela's opinion, unflattering alacrity. It reminded her of the worst of the west London women. She stood on the step, rebuttoning her waterproofs and looking out at the soggy, autumnal healer's garden. She had an idea.
'Can I count on you next spring for some thinnings from your garden and a root or two, and some strikes of this and that? I'm beginning to get the hang of herbs and decoctions and the whole process. Maybe we could work together...'
She was astonished to see the normally quite flushed Wanda go pale.
'Why?'she asked.
'Well’ said Angela, 'I'm learning fast.'
Wanda went even paler. Odd. Perhaps it was not done to drain the energy from another's source?
'You never know’ said Angela cajolingly, ‘I might even catch you up on the weaving.'
Pale was pale, but this was ridiculous. Wanc^a remained mute. Very white, very mute.
'I'll call back for the rub, shall I?' said Angela.
Wanda nodded. 'Just a minute’ she said, a trifle shiftily. And she pointed at the recipe. 'Have you got any of this stuff in your garden? Mine's all gone.'
Drachm? thought Angela, later. Drachm?
On the way back she saw the Rudges' gardener collecting up leaves and envied them having staff.
She waved at the vicar and Mrs Dorkin and her daughter, who were just going up the Tichbornes' path, probably to discuss the famous baptism.
She called to Daphne, who was just arriving at St Hilary's and who was so intent that she did not hear her.
She suggested to Craig Elliott, who panted to catch up with her, that he should choose the au pair himself next time.
And Sammy Lee came along the road with four very muddy pigs, which were, he said when she asked, going on their holidays.
And she arrived home, soaked but happy, beginning to feel that she understood the place now and that she really belonged.
Eventually, after about a week, and late in the evening, the rain stopped for a while and a bright moon lit up the garden. Despite the chill, she put on her Wellingtons and went out for a breath of air. It had been a strange day - not least because of a telephone call from her children. The first unsolicited communication between them. Usually she rang and they were either out or monosyllabic. This conversation was quite different. It was just as if nothing had happened between them. Andrew was first.
'Have you got my Fila sweater?' was his first question. 'Can I have my allowance and backdated?' was the second.
No was the answer to both.
Then Claire came on. Asking the same.
'Why isn't your father paying it?' she asked.
'Because he's paying for us to go to Australia.'
Her heart turned over. 'When?'
'Just after Christmas. He wanted us to go before but we're not budging. Have you got my green Wonderbra?'
'No' said Angela, putting aside the strange picture of herself wandering the lanes of Somerset in a laddish sporty jumper beneath which up-thrust a mighty girlish pair of tits. 'Will you two come down and see me for Christmas?'
'Can't,' said Claire. 'We might get snowed in and miss the flight.'
'You're being silly,' said Angela.
'I'm not,' said Claire laconically. 'That's what Binnie says. We're not to budge until we're on that plane.'
'Then I'll have to come up and see you. When I get back from Buenos Aires.'
'We're really broke,' said Andrew, as unswerving as if she had said back from Bognor. 'Why?'
He mumbled. She heard the words 'party' and 'Binnie' and 'bit of a mess'. And she knew. Good, she thought. Good.
So - a little evening air to cool the brain. She closed in the hens and then slithered up to the old orchard, where the bare trees huddled. Goodbye and keep cold, as the poet said. It could equally apply to her children. If they went to sunny Australia then her plan would fail.
Damn, damn, damn. Well, it was out of her hands. She would just have to hope for a miracle.
After a quick visit to the hives to check they had not gone the way of Noah, she told the bees. Maybe they could do something. Then she visited the two bare, dug-over circles. Spaces waiting for the artist's brush, she thought. At least if her plan failed she had all this. It was a comfort. Though nothing quite comforted the bruised spot that reminded her, now and then, that her husband resided elsewhere. If her plan failed she did not know what she would do. Take comfort, she supposed. Take comfort.
The windows of the kitchen glowed warm, the mulberry tree, which had fed the birds so well, soughed and tapped and waved its sexy arms, the hens slept, and indoors the hops dried. She was very, very happy here. Odd under the circumstances. It seemed that just the sight of her labours cheered her quite remarkably. She clucked an irritated cluck, not unlike her hens, and bent down to pick up that same wrapper that had w
hirled away so elusively over the Tichborne garden all those days ago. She read: 'Harvest Grain Baps. With added bran. The way you like 'em.' Curling her lip, she tutted once more. It must have come from those Travellers. Honestly, she thought, people just did not deserve the freedom of the countryside. Harvest Grain Baps were the sort of soft-food item they might buy. Whereas everyone else around here who knew what was what used Dave the Bread.