by Pippa Wright
So of course the second the door to the ladies’ closed, every single staffer set their watch and made their bet. Everyone kept their heads down, eyes flicking regularly between the ticking clock and the bathroom door. Swearing was heard as the hushed minutes passed. Noonoo’s bet on ten minutes evaporated. My twelve minutes were over and still the door remained shut. Only Lysander and Flickers were left in the game, having bet on twenty-two minutes and twenty-five, respectively. Lysander glided past the bathroom door after twenty minutes, holding a piece of paper to try to look like he was engaged in work, but giving himself away by seeming to recall, unconvincingly, something that meant he had to double back on himself to pass back again twice more. I didn’t know why he didn’t just press a glass to the door and openly listen in; it wouldn’t have been any less obvious.
Ticky finally broke the silence. ‘Holy macaroni, Roars,’ she hissed across our office. ‘I am, like, absolutely busting for a waz. What the faahrk do you think they’re arguing about this time?’
‘Just the usual, I expect,’ I said. Noonoo frowned over from her desk with a finger to her lips; clearly she too was hoping to hear something from the direction of the lavatories.
‘Saahriously, can’t they have their stupid rows somewhere else?’ whispered Ticky furiously. ‘I am, like, this close to actually buying a chamber pot for our office. And don’t even think I am joking.’
‘You could always get a catheter,’ I suggested helpfully.
‘Yah, thanks, Roars, can we just, like, stop talking about wee, it’s making me more desperate.’
‘So I shouldn’t mention waterfalls or gushing taps or anything?’
‘Roars, you faahrking cow,’ said Ticky, wrapping one leg over the other and squeezing them together tightly.
At last, after twenty-six minutes, the door to the ladies’ swung open and Amanda emerged. She glared around the office as if challenging anyone else to dare argue with her, but no one would meet her stare; all eyes were fixed with unlikely dedication upon computer screens. Flickers kept his face impassive, but marked his triumph with an under-the-table air-punch of victory.
‘Come oooon, Martha,’ hissed Ticky, bouncing up and down in her seat, legs still crossed. ‘Pull yourself together and get out of there or I’m going to have to go in.’
The door opened again, more slowly this time, and Martha emerged, her downcast eyes and slumped shoulders telling us, as if we didn’t already know, that she had been defeated once more.
Ticky leapt out of her seat and ran to the loo, closely followed by Noonoo, who had obviously also been holding on for too long. They sped past Martha without even looking at her. In fact, out of a combination of sympathy and fear, no one ever properly looked at Martha when she emerged from one of her bathroom battles. She had been known to snap furiously at any attempt to speak to her after one of Amanda’s dressing-downs.
So I was pretty surprised when she stopped in the doorway to my office, raising her red-rimmed eyes from the beige office carpet. I waited for her to speak first, in case this was a trick and she was just looking to shout at the first person who made the mistake of attempting to open a conversation. Behind her back, Flickers held out a palm to his office-mates, demanding his winnings.
‘Rory,’ Martha said finally.
‘Hi, Martha,’ I said.
‘Rory, it turns out that I can’t make it to Seaton Hall on Monday after all,’ Martha said, pressing her lips together and pausing for a moment. ‘Amanda – Amanda suggested that someone else can be more easily spared from the office.’
‘Oh, Martha,’ I said. I knew she’d been working on this feature on the Duke of Delaval’s restoration project for months. Even without the leverage of an aristocratic background, she had persuaded him to allow Country House an exclusive preview of Seaton Hall before the official press day, when the usual crowd of gravy-train-boarding journalists would troop from room to room in a recalcitrant pack.
Martha looked up at the ceiling instead of at me. ‘I specifically asked that it should be you who replaced me.’
‘That’s really kind of you, Martha,’ I began. ‘Are you sure?’ Martha jealously guarded her country house visits, and having been forced to give it up, I feared she would be more critical of me than ever.
Martha straightened up, shaking her head a little and smoothing her black skirt, its cheap fabric shiny with age. ‘It is enough that Amanda is sure,’ she said, suddenly brisk and efficient. ‘It’s too late to change the schedule so you’ll have to stick to the one I’ve already set up. Train Monday morning at seven-thirty, meet the photographer there. Staying overnight at the Delaval Arms on the estate, coming back Tuesday on the eleven-forty-five, okay?’
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Who’s the photographer? Nicky Bentworth?’
‘No, the condition for exclusive access was that we had to use the duchess’s nephew as the photographer, Lance Garcia. You’ll meet him up at Seaton Hall.’
‘Lance Garcia?’ I asked, frowning in confusion. ‘I’ve never heard of him, have you?’ Country House’s photographers were all from the same upper-class tweedy stable, and practically interchangeable. They were Hugos and Olivers and Barnabys. Never Lances.
‘No. The duchess is an American,’ sniffed Martha, in much the same way that she might say, ‘The duchess has recently escaped from a psychiatric institution.’ ‘I believe her nephew is from San Francisco. Quite what he will know about photographing historic houses, I do not know. The entire situation will require firm supervision. I hope you are up to it.’
‘I’m sure I am,’ I said. Actually I was pretty unsure, but the opportunity to get far, far away from London and thoughts of Martin was too good to turn down. Not to mention that I might actually be able to get a hot shower at the Delaval Arms.
‘Good. I’ll bring you my dossier on Seaton Hall later today,’ said Martha. She started to walk away and then turned back. Her face was calm, but her hands betrayed her, holding on to the door frame with white knuckles as if she might rip it away from the wall, Incredible Hulk-style. ‘I am sure I can trust you to do me justice.’
I frowned at her departing back, unsure what she could have meant. Was she trying to appoint me as some kind of deputy in her battles against Amanda? A fellow class warrior against the rahs? There was no way I was stepping into anything that might drag me into the bathroom wars. Or did she mean that Seaton Hall was too important to mess up? Like I didn’t know that – the entire heritage industry had been itching to get a glimpse of the property for the five years that the duke and duchess had been restoring it. But the duchess had refused to allow anyone access until completion; all anybody knew was that it had cost millions. It was a privilege to be invited to see it at all, let alone before everyone else.
‘Kerr-ist,’ said Ticky, swinging back into her seat and exhaling loudly. ‘What a relief. I peed like a fricking racehorse.’
‘Nice; thanks for sharing.’
‘Did I just see Martha leaving?’ she asked. ‘Tell me she didn’t come to share her thoughts on the bathroom argument?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘She’s told me I have to take over her visit to Seaton Hall next week. The Duke of Delaval’s restoration feature.’
‘She gave up Seaton Hall!’ Ticky exclaimed, scenting drama. She leaned forward in her seat and propped her elbows on the desk in official listening stance. ‘No way! Goouurd, that must have been what they were arguing about. She wouldn’t have let go of that without a fight. But why are they getting you to do it?’
‘I don’t know. Martha said something about me being her specific choice. And she wants me to keep an eye on the photographer – he’s not got much experience.’
‘Weird,’ mused Ticky, putting her feet on the desk and swinging from side to side on her wheeled chair as she stared at the ceiling. ‘I wonder if Maaahn let her choose her replacement to soften the blow of not letting her go. Of course Marth would think you’re the easiest person to boss around – she can kind of do the feature
by proxy through you.’
‘Er, or she thought I’d do a good job, Ticky,’ I said.
‘Oh yah,’ she agreed. ‘Course you will, Roars, I’m not doubting that. But admit it – Martha’s got a much better chance of getting you to do her bidding than she has, like, Noonoo or someone else who’d stick their own ideas all over it and insist on taking the glory.’
‘Whatever,’ I snapped. Ticky was so pushy and thick-skinned, she didn’t see the virtues of doing things my way – carefully, gently, behind the scenes, without causing offence. Just because I didn’t get involved in stand-up rows, or insist on doing things my way, it didn’t mean I was a pushover.
‘Who’s the photographer?’ she asked, flicking her hair over to one side.
‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ I asked.
‘Who. Is. It?’ said Ticky, a mysterious smile playing on her lips.
‘No one we know – some random relative of the duchess.’
‘Male or female?’
‘Male. What are you getting at?’
‘Name?’
‘Lance Garcia,’ I said.
‘Lance?’
‘He’s from San Francisco.’
Ticky smirked, and flicked her hair once more.
‘Roars, oh my Goouurd, unsuitable man alert!’
‘What?’ I said. ‘Lance Garcia? This isn’t a date, Ticky, it’s a Monday night in Derbyshire doing a feature.’
‘Umm, news flash, Roars. V Day?’
‘V Day?’ I echoed.
‘Yah, Monday’s Valentine’s Day, Roars, had you really not noticed?’ Ticky shrieked with laughter. ‘And you’re going to be stuck in a romantic country hotel with a totally, brilliantly unsuitably gay man. It’s too good. I couldn’t make it up. Oh Goouurd, it’s priceless.’
‘Wait a second,’ I said. ‘How do you know he’s gay? Do you know him?’
‘I don’t know him, Roars,’ Ticky sniggered, ‘but he’s a photographer, he’s from San Francisco and his name is Lance. Sahhriously. Even you should have been able to work that one out.’
Should I? Why was it that, the moment I split up with Martin, it seemed like the world was operating in a way that everyone understood but me?
6
Although I supposedly now lived in one of London’s greener areas, it was never more obvious than on leaving the city for the real countryside that Clapham Common was little more than a glorified urban roundabout. The Common’s muddy, trodden-down expanses of brown grass, dotted with dog mess and greasy fried-chicken containers, were still barren and wintry, but the windows looking out of the train to Derbyshire showed the first signs of spring. A few stubborn streaks of snow were visible on the tops of the distant hills, but the fields on either side of the track looked fresh and new in the weak morning sunlight. Tree branches, still bare against the sky, were softened and greened by the buds of new leaves; bright yellow daffodils shone out from the hedgerows. As the train made its way north, early lambs could be seen in the fields, huddled next to their mothers. I spent far too long staring out of the window daydreaming, and thinking about last spring when Martin and I had been preparing to move into our new home. It felt like it had been a long, long winter.
Martha had extravagantly booked herself a seat in first class, and the carriage was almost empty this early in the morning, except for a couple of businessmen tucking into their full English breakfasts. The restful journey made me even less inclined to get to work, but after I changed trains at Stockport I ordered a cup of Earl Grey to try to wake myself up, and pulled Martha’s dossier out of my bag.
Not for our features editor the clinical efficiency of a PowerPoint presentation. It looked as if she had scooped the contents of her recycling bin into a manila envelope: the dossier bulged with cuttings, Post-it notes and torn-out notebook pages. On top of the bundle of papers, held together by a straining red rubber band, was a memo in which Martha provided a full list of questions for me to ask, stressed various points of history that I should touch on in the feature, instructed me in how to address a duke and duchess (including her recommendation that one should curtsey, but she would leave this to my discretion) and, highlighted in bold, the hot tip (as Martha saw it) that the duchess, the former Bibi Wishart of Marin County, California, had been in her previous life a textile designer, which necessitated as many gushing comments as possible on all fabrics within the Seaton Hall estate. Compliment the curtains! exhorted a scribbled note in the margin. Underlined three times was her final comment: Think Romance! Her Grace intends to hire the house out for weddings.
Instead of feeling, as Ticky had suggested, annoyed by Martha’s micro-management from afar, or affronted at her assumption that I wouldn’t know how to behave, I felt grateful and a bit sad. Looking at all the work she had put into the trip made me feel guilty that I was the one who was getting the benefit. Of course I owed it to her to conduct the visit as she would have done (though I drew the line at actually curtseying). The memo also revealed that I would be collected from Buxton Station by a driver. I marvelled at the luxury and felt another pang for Martha.
Usually press trips were an undignified bunfight in which a large group of journalists would be herded from the train into a rackety minibus, the seating on which operated under an unspoken but rigid hierarchy. At the front sat the broadsheet journalists, holding themselves apart from all of us by virtue of their importance and influence, and a certain studied ennui that spoke of the many more important matters that weighed on their minds, which we lesser hacks could not possibly understand. In the middle seats sat journalists like me, from small, specialist magazines of limited and dwindling readership, clinging on to the last vestiges of former glory. We had prestige, thanks to the historical reputation of our publications, but no power. And we were glad of the day out; at least, I always was. At the back of the bus, like the naughtiest schoolchildren, sat the freelancers; usually of a certain age, they were here for one thing only: free stuff. Overexcited by the proximity of so many others in comparison to their solitary working-from-home existences, they talked loudly of former trips, the superiority/inferiority of the lunch/tea that had been provided for us, their glory days as features writers for now defunct publications, and the poor state of current heritage journalism. They were to be avoided as much as possible, since they would almost certainly try to pitch a feature to you if you showed the slightest weakness and also because everyone, from the editor of the Sunday Times Home section downwards, superstitiously feared that their lowly career prospects might be catching.
There were no such indignities on this trip. I was astonished to be collected not just by a car, but one driven by a chauffeur in a peaked cap and a uniform. I felt like a heroine in a 1930s novel as the car hummed smoothly through the country lanes towards Seaton Hall, although I suspected my ancestors in the thirties would have been found scrubbing pans in the scullery rather than swanning around in motor cars. As we swung through the gates of the estate, the Delaval Arms, where I’d be staying tonight, could be seen across the park, a low stone building that had once been a hunting lodge. It was a full five minutes along a wooded drive before the Hall itself came into view, but it was worth the wait.
Seaton Hall had, as do all the true country houses of England, a history that spanned the centuries with a combination of elegance and eccentricity. It had begun its existence as a Saxon hall, built for defence and warmth rather than beauty, its only windows high slits in the thick stone walls. This was the view that greeted me: forbidding and yet beautiful, with a heavily studded wooden door set deep within the Derbyshire stone. I knew that beyond this hall the house had been added to extensively: there was a Georgian wing, and a Victorian Gothic addition, not to mention a poor attempt, sneered at by Pevsner, at a Palladian walkway on the eastern side. But the mishmash of styles had been saved by the continuity of the local limestone, which gave the building, the dossier said, an overall appearance of harmony. None of this could be seen as we proceeded up the drive;
only the ancient hall was visible, presenting a façade that must have hardly changed for hundreds of years. I imagined that the door might open to reveal a rush-strewn floor, the duke and his retinue eating off trenchers and throwing the bones to a pack of rangy wolfhounds by the light of a roaring fire.
But when I stepped out of the car, the door was opened by someone who could only be Lance Garcia, running excitably towards the car in a distinctly twenty-first-century manner.
‘Aurora Carmichael?’ he asked, flinging his arms around me while I stood stock-still in surprise. ‘OMG, I am so glad to see you. Bibi wanted you to get the whole aged-retainer-opening-the-door experience, but I said, “Bibi, this girl is British, she is not going to be impressed with a butler like we tragic Americans, she’s probably met a million butlers working for Country House,” am I right?’
‘Hello, you must be Lance,’ I said, stepping backwards to see him properly. I wasn’t quite sure how to answer the butler question as really it was only rich Americans and investment bankers who had them these days. Most posh British people were too impoverished to afford one.
‘The very same,’ Lance said, leaning into the car and instructing the driver to drop my overnight bag at the Delaval Arms. With a crunch of gravel the silent chauffeur drove away.
As I followed Lance up the wide stone steps to the open door of the Hall, I had the opportunity to admire his Californian ensemble, as exotic and unlikely in this environment as a bird of paradise in a henhouse. His long, lean legs were clad in lemon-yellow denim, and his feet tripped up the steps in vivid-green Converse. A checked shirt peeped out from under his lime V-necked jumper, and a silver skull ring flashed its diamante eyes on the smallest finger of his left hand. I suspected that Ticky might be right about the duchess’s San Francisco nephew.