Metamorphoses

Episode 5: Metamorphoses

    “Isn’t that a car?” asks Greg, looking up briefly from the new p.c. he bought in Portsmouth.

    “Uh… dunno. Might be. You ever heard of an automatic indexing program?”

    “Um, no. –I think it is,” he says, cheek flattened to the window of the dinette. He didn’t buy a desk in Portsmouth, probably because the computer took all his spare cash plus and a temporary loan from a certain pregnant sucker not a million miles away from what the new Ordnance Survey map he bought in Portsmouth has indicated is actually Miller’s Bay. There’s no mill here, you can’t even see the site of where the old mill used to be from here, and John’s maternal grandfather’s family that owned the dump since shortly after William the Conqueror were not then and never have been called Miller. Oh, well. Maybe there’ll be a pamphlet about it in the local history collection in the Portsmouth library. Corruption of Muller? Meller? Moller? Maller? Mallee? No, think we only got that in Oz. …Mealer? “Huh?”

    “It’s a taxi. No, a taxi-truck.”

    “Wuff!”

    “Huh?” And there’s a loud knock at the front door.

    “I'll go!” Sure, go. Is he expecting someone? His mum, come down to see he’s getting enough to eat? Imelda, cringe, come down to keep us company because her school hols have started?

    Phew, no, it’s only Rupy! …Where the Christ did all that luggage come from?

    “Hullo to you and lovely to see you, too,” I croak, goggling at it, mounds of it. Not just suitcases, by any means. Huge oddly-shaped parcels. Is that a wrapped-up chair? “Eh? Yeah, my wallet’s upstairs on the dressing-table, think there’s some money in it, go for it.”—He rushes off, while Greg’s still standing there with his mouth open.—“Whatever those giant packages are, that’s what he’ll of spent all his dough on,” I explain.

    He nods numbly.

    What was in my wallet seems to cover it, and Rupy bustles over to the dining-table and writes out an IOU on—“NOT THAT!”—on a clean sheet of paper.

    “What—is—in—those—huge—packages?” I then ask clearly, as Tim sniffs round them very suspiciously indeed.

    “No need to shout!” He starts the explanation. I remember that divine idea we had about Jamaica— No. Well, I ought to, the terry-claath robes, dear! And so, being as how neither of us is actually making it to the actual Jamaica this year, he thought we’d have it here!

    The weather has warmed quite a bit, nevertheless we both gape at him as if he’s barmy.

    “You’ll see!” He throws himself at the packages and starts unwrapping and unpacking and opening madly. Tim rushes round mad with excitement, getting in the way. Greg gives in totally and joins in… It is a chair: the reason the driver heaved it about so casually is it’s a white cane one. There’s another to match, and a little table. Where I come from they’re generally made in the Philippines, but if he claims it’s the Jamaican look, so be it. The really weird shape is a collapsed collapsible swing, complete with a huge fringed awning to shade us from the pale yellow English sun that sometimes manages to heat the ambient air to twenty-five degrees Celsius. The almost as weird things that the taxi-truck man had to leave outside, with a lot of loud muttering, are sort of… I break down and get as far as the lobby, and peer. Huge sort of prong things that Rupy reckons we’re gonna sling hammocks from because he remembered, very proud, that there are no trees in John’s front garden. Greg by this time is out there eagerly putting them up.—See? Pant, pant. This is how they go!—Yeah, I see. Oh, well, at least the two nongs aren’t proposing screwing giant hooks into John’s very old brickwork, one mercy.

    And these—grabbing me by the arm, Ow!—and attempting to whirl me and the bulge back inside—are the actual hammocks! Yeah, delish, Rupy. Like something out of a Vogue nightmare of Olde Jamaica.—Glare, glare.—Well, they are! White and lacy, to match the cane set, no doubt, with giant fringes: what did he expect me to say? Now, if he’d of brought the Planter’s Punch along, and if I was allowed to DRINK it, it might be a different story!

    “I refrained from rum, dear,” he says, reading my mind, “but if you open that lovely wicker hamper you’ll find a tin of pi—”

    “Pineapple juice? Oh, boy! I haven’t had had that since I was home!” I hurl myself upon the hamper. Gawdelpus, it’s fully lined with a tropical pattern of huge blue, pink, yellow and turquoise blooms, mixed hibiscus and bougainvillaea, at a guess, that matches the pattern of the swing’s cushions and huge fringed awning. Where the Hell’s he been? He can’t have found all this in Michael’s village: one arty-tarty shop selling crap even worse than our village’s arty-tarty shop sells is its level. Underneath the piles of matching serviettes, table napkins to some, I find it. Plus tins and tins of— Cripes. Is this an actual Fortnum’s hamper?

    “Wuff! Wuff!”

    Limply I give Tim the fake bone that must be there for the porpoise. Buster likes those, too. Only the thing is, Tim’s teeth are so strong he’ll have destroyed it in less than five— Never mind, it was a lovely thought.

    “Lovely thought, Rupy!” I say as the male idiot, not them, the third one, rushes off into a corner with it, growling slightly: does he imagine one of us wants to steal it?

    “Ta ever so, dear,” smirk, smirk. Oh, well, he’s not all bad. Put it like this, his heart’s in the right place. But who paid for this lot? Ulp, found someone’s Gold Card just lying round at the Festival? Even more ulp, pinched someone’s Gold Card after a delirious night with the someone?

    “There’s lots more juice in one of those cartons,” he adds proudly. Greg tries to lift one and gasps and staggers.

    “Rupy, what happened?” I croak. “Have you won a lottery?”

    No, he hasn’t. But once we’ve collapsed onto the honourable sofa with huge glasses of iced pineapple juice in our fists (I knew there was some purpose in making all those ice-blocks in an English summer other than deadening the taste of that fortified orange juice muck), he reveals all. Greg’s horrified but gamely tries not to let it show. Some time during the Festival Rupy met a grocer. To be strictly accurate, a man who owns a large chain, possibly several large chains, of cash ’n’ carry type supermarkets. The grocer had once, in his gay youth, I use the phrase advisedly, met Rupy at another festival, or possibly the same one: the thing’s been going since before the War. Rupy was thrilled to meet him again, he recognised him instantly, even though he’d put on weight: those eyes were unmistakable, and the mop of lovely dark ringlets was as thick as ever, but much shorter and of course quite silvered, and he was so intrigued to meet his lovely wife! And to hear all about their two lovely children and their one grandchild and another on the way, and the lovely house in the Cotswolds and the villa in Portugal. The word “BLACKMAIL” now appears on Greg’s forehead in neon letters ten feet high, as you can imagine, but it wasn’t that, Rupy isn’t so crude and he’d never descend to actual blackmail. He just chatted very cosily with the grocer in a slightly coy way. And the offer of whatever it was gonna take followed as night the day.

    “Shoup uh ash’ ’im uh BM Bub’Yer,” I note, allowing a deliciously pineappley ice-block to slide down my glass and rest on my nose… Oof! Goddit! Slurp! Lovely!

    “Don’t be so disgusting,” he says with dignity. Greg’s looking at him with approval for the first time in quite some time, but he’s about to be— “Nice people, however pregnant, do not slurp at their ice-cubes in that way.” –Disillusioned, quite.

    “I said, ya should’ve asked him for a Beamer,” I clarify, sighing. Boy, that juice was good! “How many cans are there”

    “No idea. And I wouldn’t lower myself, dear, given that no actual Beamers were on offer.”

    “No. Well, ya done good. And I tell ya what, if it rains we can put the swing up in here, no sweat! Only I don’t think we’ll be able to get those prong things for the hammocks through the door.” I look speculatively up at these giant wooden beams that are a feature of John’s cottage…

    “Rosie, I think those beams date from the eighteenth century, at least!” says Greg urgently.

    “Quite. Don’t worry, Greg, dear: I wouldn’t dream of letting her. You’ll soon realise she has the aesthetic instincts of a Dame Edna,” Rupy says severely, rising. “I think there may be some caviar somewhere, dears. Oh, and I made sure they included some of John’s special Royal marmalade.”

    “For God’s sake don’t tell him where it came from!” gasps Greg. He looks awfully blue around the mouth: is he gonna pass out? Uh—no, don’t think so. It must be the colour Indians go when they’re contemplating the idea of a senior Royal Navy captain finding out he’s eating blackmailed Royal marmalade from a rich ex-gay grocer.

    “He’d think it was funny, ya nana,” I say kindly, but he doesn’t look convinced.

    Rupy’s ferreting in cartons… “There’s definitely some in the hamper,” I say kindly. “Rupy, did he outfit you from top to toe, or did you just nick that gear?” I add, giving in completely.

    “Mm? Oh, top to toe, dear! We went up to town: Janet, that’s the wife, was thrilled to offer me a lift, it gave her the opportunity to ask me all about making The Captain’s Daughter, and to get a real scoop on Series Five.”

    “Have you seen any of the scripts for Five?”

    “No. I was able to tell her that Euan will be in it, and the rest I made up. Well, compound of Henny Penny gossip and pure imagination, really, dear. –Ah!” He straightens. “Faisan en gêlée. Fancy a little alfresco brunch à la supreme Noël under the palm trees?”

    Well, yes, but there aren’t any palm trees. “Yeah, let’s: why not?”

    “It’s the middle of the afternoon,” Greg objects faintly.

    “I’m sure supreme Noël always had his brunch in the middle of the afternoon. Probably consisted of fayzong ong jelly, too,” I say crudely. “Can we eat the caviar, Rupy, or is it just for show?”

    “As much as you fancy, Rosie, darling.”

    “Good.” I've no doubt Greg has set the hammocks up properly, but on consideration of the bulge… “Think you two can have the hammocks, I’ll bags the swing for the time being.”

    Resigned to his fate, Greg gets on with putting the giant awninged swing up for me, and me and Rupy go into the kitchen and sort out some bread. No lemons, Rosie? Oh, well, there are plenty of limes in one of those cartons, one felt that limes were very Jamaican, dear.

    I investigate. “This is a whole jackfruit,” I croak.

    “Oh? One thought it might be a breadfruit, dear.”

    “Same genus, I think. Dunno how ya tell if they’re ripe. Um, these pawpaws will need to go in the sun for a few days, Rupy: they’ll taste of soap if we eat them when they’re this green.”

    He bows to my superior knowledge. The sun it shall be. But he thought the name was papaya?

    I don’t bother to explain, he’s relentlessly North-centric, it’d be in one ear and out the other. “Whatever. The peaches look okay.” I try a grape or two. “Good, the grapes are ripe: Californian, by the look of them. You didn’t think of cheese, didja, when ya were maundering along on the tropical theme?” Certainly he thought of cheese! Crumbs, a whole wheel of Brie. I poke it cautiously. “John reckons they have to be real soft. Um, well bung it in the pantry. Any of that Red Something-ester stuff I like?” Proudly he produces something red, doesn’t look like the stuff in the neat little square packets we get from our friendly supermarket nearest the flat. Smells very cheesy, and it’s very, very big. Oh, well, try anything once.

    And at the expense only of a few pinched fingers and curses from Greg—some of them sounded real interesting, pity they were in Punjabi, but—we’re able to settle down to a divine Jamaican brunch à la supreme Noël under the non-existent palm trees. Rupy in a divine tee-shirt, tropical blooms on white, with his new white linen trou’ and his new white panama with the bright turquoise ribbon, and me in a shocking-pink bikini top, the sort that’s two triangles of cloth plus a few shoe-string str— Ya got that, huh? And a brand-new tropical sarong over the bulge, splashy blue, red, yellow, turquoise and pink tropical blooms on a white ground, and Greg in his ordinary gear, having refused to get into a sarong. Bit of a pity: tropic blooms on white’d look good against that bronzy brown skin.

    Next day. The picture wasn’t quite complete, so we get Graham Howell to drive us into Portsmouth and do just a little bit of shopping. Not believing them when they swear they’ll deliver it this afternoon, which is just as well.

    The day after. They’ve delivered it, so now we can have a really divine lunch, overlooking the fact that Greg and I ought to be working, with our tropical sun umbrellas up! Greg and Rupy almost came to blows over which pattern so we bought three, why not? And a small pink tent for Tim in case he feels like sheltering from the sun—not a pup tent, the tent man was very offended when Rupy went into hysterics in the middle of his esoteric and highly technical camping-gear display.  Plus a few oddments, like a couple of huge straw mats, not sure why, Rupy thought they looked tropical, and a dinky little white cane trolley for drinkie-poos, its wheels don’t work too good either on the straw mats or the bumpy lawn. Or, come to that, on the crazy-paving path. Plus and new giant sun-hats for us all, the large straw-coloured sort that have big straw fringes, not droopy but sticking out, geddit? Too bad if ya don’t. And new footwear, at home we innocently call them thongs, Rupy’s forbidden me utterly to say it here in the North. Coloured rubber flip-flops.

    And, because John didn’t have anything in except the usual very expensive brandy and several square bottles of whisky and an almost empty bottle of gin that dated back to B.P.—Before Preggy, ya goddit, huh?—a carton, why not, save making another trip—of Jamaican rum. John’s given me joint access to his bank account and the credit card to go with it. Which of course I privately decided, I was in my D.L. Sayers woman-of-honour thing at the time, I would not use. No, well, more fool him. And it serves him bloody well right for going off to sea!

    Now that we’re back home it dawns that the jaunt to Portsmouth would’ve been the perfect opportunity to buy a desk to put Greg’s computer on and even a desk to put my computer on and let John have his dining-table back, but too bad, the rest of us don’t mind eating in the kitchen or in front of the telly, or, of course, alfresco, à la supreme Noël.

    And what with this, that and the other—not to mention the fact that Greg’s broken down and got into his bathers and had a dip and, giving in, tolerantly got into a sarong afterwards, Rupy’s eyes just about bolting from his head, can’t blame him, the effect’s all that one imagined and more—it isn’t until the two of them are having their second after-lunch rum and pineapples and I’m just finishing that pâté off—tastes really good on top of the grapes and peaches, they must’ve cleaned my palate—that Greg says cautiously: “We thought Katie might come back with you, Rupy.”

    “He went up to London, clot!”

    “Um, yeah.”

    “Thought she might have rung you, dears. –Don’t eat that!” Rupy screams. Greg pauses, slice of lime halfway to his mouth, and I pause, piece of bread and pâté halfway to my— “Him, not you! And when Varley sees how much weight you’ve put on, I’m not counting the bulge, he will kill you!”

    I shrug and eat wonderful Fortnum’s pâté with superette white bread, mmm…

    “It’s very sour, Greg, dear,” he’s explaining.

    Greg just grins and chews it up juicily.

    “Rupy, you idiot, his mum makes lime pickle. Lime pickle.”

    “Oops, silly me. No well, as I was about to say before so rudely,” he says jauntily, overlooking the fact that it was him did the interrupting, “—do NOT give pâté to that dog! John will kill you!”—I give Tim an apologetic look and eat the pâté myself.—“As I was saying, Euan’s taken Katie off to his lair.”

    I choke on the last crumb of pâté. “The poncy bachelor pad in London?”

    “Yes. And if that doesn’t turn her off the man, nothing will!”

    He’s got a point. The pad’s all white with touches of spindly black wrought-iron and tubular steel, and the bathroom’s all black, period. Though the dump does feature what the experts tell me is a great view of the river.

    “Uh—yeah. Um, what did she seem like, Rupy?” I ask in a doomed voice.

    “We-ell… Overlooking the fact that the hormones were running riot, Rosie, dear?”

    “No, you can leave that bit in: I think it’s a factor that will have to be taken into account.”

    He pulls a lugubrious face. “Yes. Well, very pink and lit up, that warm look, y’know?”

    Cringe. I shut my eyes momentarily. “How graphic.”

    “Was that a compliment? Oh, ta ever so!” he chirps. “Um… Well, I wouldn’t say her critical faculties were entirely suspended, dear, because when he asked her if the matinée that The Observer critic was observed at had gone well, she said she didn’t think any of them had been on form, and that what should have been his best scene with the fair Amanda had dragged.”

    We’re staring at him with our jaws sagging.

    “Well, she is a bright girl, you know! But that apart… Well, there was a particularly sticky evening when Euan made her get into borrowed plumage because some Hollywood Names were expected—not Derry Dawlish!” he adds quickly as my eyes bulge—“and poor old Michael was trying to do his bit, you see, so he said that in his opinion she looked perfectly nice in her own little dress and why had she changed?”—He pauses for breath. We’re both transfixed, mouths slightly open, you know the style of thing.—“And she just said calmly that she didn’t think it would be fair to Euan to do the Jane Eyre bit.”

    After a long, long time I say very faintly: “Fair to Euan.”

    “Mm. Well, she did look delish, dear, made the Hollywood tarts look tarty. Not that they don’t, always. Have you seen what they’ve done to divine little—”

    “Yes! Shut up!”

    He doesn’t shut up, he says: “It was dark blue satin, strapless—long, of course. With a little gauze over-blouse, very plain, sleeveless, in the same shade of blue. And the hair worn rather up, made her look a lot older.”

    Even Greg’s got that point: he says grimly: “Maybe it was meant to.”

    “Mm. Well, the next day she was getting round in her usual gear, but given that the usual gear these days seems to be all those pirate pants and Fifties tops that Someone can’t get into, it doubtless never dawned on anyone that she’d stopped making concessions to anyone.”

    “It thought I told you to shut up?” I sigh.

    He does, and we lapse into gloom, slightly tempered on their side by the Jamaican rum…

    “Given the shits that were there—”

     Jesus! “Um, yeah?” I say weakly, opening my eyes.

    “Oh, sorry dear, had you nodded off? I knew the longer swing was the better option! Darling Mal tried to convince me the two-seaters were prettier. I was just saying, given the shits that were at the Festival, it could have been a lot, lot worse.”

    “Rupy, she’d have had a one-night stand or even a week with whatever shit, and that would have been it!”

    “Yeah,” admits Greg, yawning.

    “Oh.” Thinks about it. “Well, at least she won’t catch anything from Euan,” he says kindly. “He is a nice boy, Rosie, dear.”

    “Rupy, read my lips. He is a man. M,A,N, man. Thirty-fi—” Cough. “Thirty-three, almost thirty-four. Much too old for a twenty-year-old kid that’s barely past the fooling around in the back of his dad’s car with the boy next-door stage!”

    “Yeah. Don’t tell us the rest again, thanks,” Greg warns heavily.

    “No. Sorry.”

    “She feels responsible because it was her brought her up to London and exposed her to him,” Rupy explains kindly.

    “Yeah, I’d worked that out, thanks, Rupy,” he says, grinning at him.

    I do not! What absolute rubbish!

    Rupy's explaining loftily to Greg that I’ve got more in common with John than you’d think: conscience, though you’d never think it to listen to me, responsibility hang-up— Blah-blah. What total bullshit. I’m gonna go inside and get some work done! …In a minute.

    “Hullo, Sleeping Beauty!”

    Gasp, fright! “What—”

    Jack Powell, John’s wood man, plumber to the villagers, and general handyman. Short, wiry, red-cheeked, with short, curly dark hair going grey. A really nice bloke. He does have a bit of a crush on me, as the whole village is now aware. But he can’t help that, poor Jack.

    Groggily I attempt to sit up— Ooh! Forgot I was in the swing. Kindly Jack steadies it, grinning down at me. Who put this rug over me? Uh—and whose rug is it?

    “Have a nice nap?” –Grin, grin. Look, they’re all the same, Royal Navy or plumber, gay or straight. Jesus! Let them try carrying the bloody sprogs to term and see how they’d cope! Nine months in bed, you said it.

    “Yeah. What’s the time?”

    Fiveish, apparently. Where the Hell are they? I stare round groggily.

    “Young Greg’s inside, working at his computer,” Jack says kindly. “He tells me Tim’s taken Rupy for a walk.”

    “Oh.”

    “What is all this?” he says, grin, grin.

    “Ya mean, what is all this and does John know about it, don’tcha, Jack?” I retort grimly.

    Immediately he goes into a painful paroxysm. It’s so bad he has to wipe his eyes on a huge hanky with strange black stains on it. “Something like that!” he wheezes. “–Engine oil,” he explains, realising I’m transfixed by the hanky. “It’s been washed. Won’t come out.”

    “Yeah, yeah. –It’s new, he doesn’t know about it, and what the eye doesn’t see.”

    “When is he due back?” he says, oddly enough ceasing to grin.

     Sigh. “Very soon. August.”

    “Next week, or in four weeks’ time?” he asks grimly, eyeing the bulge.

    “I dunno, Jack. He said August.”

    “Mm. Any sign of Terence?” –John’s brother, think I’ve mentioned him. Entirely pro-me, but, then, he’s a hetero bloke. Not to mention, a player. Not to mention been divorced twice, from persons of whom Lady Mother entirely disapproves. Forty-four, drives a sub. Rank of Commander, if ya wanna know.

    “No. At sea. Well, under it.”

    His mouth tightens. After a minute he manages to ask: “And I suppose their bloody parents haven’t so much as rung you?”

    Admiral Sir Bernard and Miriam, Lady Haworth, to us yobs, he means, folks. When we were introduced I was in a perfectly acceptable Fifties-style dress: white piqué with a halter top, really sharp tailored collar, full skirt, tight waist, narrow red belt. Like, not scungy jeans and a grimy tee-shirt with no bra. So they took one look at me and decided to hate me forever. I gather that good old Terence has since had a go at them on the subject of John not finding anything else at his age that’s from a decent family background, has enough brains to ensure their grandchild will get into university, and actually wants to settle down and have kids with him in his cottage, as opposed to setting up illicit love-nests smothered in puce and magenta crap. However, it didn’t do any good. This was only partly because they’d seen the pics of me as Lily Rose, including the one in the sort of paper they don’t take. Shot from the back, just turning round, y’know? Not all of the bum showing, good view of tit but no nipple, as Brian ordered. That one. And partly it was because I’m an Australian who in real life doesn’t coo coyly in an upper-middle British accent as in the series, but speaks like a Dinkum Aussie (slightly ameliorated by St Agatha’s Putrid Academy for Young Ladies, but their ears not being attuned, they can’t hear that). And partly it was because my dad’s a bookie. The half-John’s-age bit wouldn’t count if I was an upper-class English moron, but as it is, it’s in there, too. Never mind that it makes the production of grandchildren that much more likely.

    “Um, no. Fiona rings every other day, though.” –That’s John’s sister. Thought she was anti-me at first, but no, she was only anti John having a fling with a dumb blonde 21st-century Marilyn Monroe. She’s very pro John getting married and having kids with a Fellow at London University. And actually thinks the Lily Rose Rayne bit is funny. But then, she’s a whole different generation from Sir and Lady.

    Jack sniffs but appears slightly mollified. So what’s he here for? Came over to see if we needed any odd jobs doing, right. (Not to say, just to check up on me.) He thinks we’d better take these cushions inside, because of the dew. Ugh—righto. (Dew? Sydney doesn’t get dew in summer. What the Hell.) We take the swing’s tropical cushions inside. Then we have a cuppa, why not? Taking one out to Greg: he's immersed, he just grunts thanks. And Jack checks that I haven’t bunged up the sink, the waste-disposal or the dishwasher, and in spite of the fact that I manifestly won’t have bunged up the bogs with pads or tampons, goes to check that they’re flushing nicely.

    Comes back to the kitchen. “You thought about doing up that blue room as a nursery?”

   (No.) “Um, not really, Jack. Well, Terence reckoned he was gonna wrench the ancestral cradle back off Lady Mother.”

    “Ya mean she took it back?” he croaks.

    I give him an ironic look. “Gee, Jack, she wouldn’t let it stay here after she’d found out that Matt wasn’t John’s!”

    He breathes heavily.

    “Apparently the fucking upper clawsses ya got in England are like that. You ever thought of coming out to Oz, Jack?”

    “You ever thought of going back?” he retorts grimly, the nostrils flared. Shit, he’s really, really furious, dear Jack, he’s such a nice bloke. Wish to God I knew of someone nice who’d do for him—he’s divorced, lives with his daughter and son-in-law and their little boy. Well, the son-in-law, Steve, is a sensible bloke but he’s at sea most of the time. Engineer’s mate, something of the sort. And as the daughter’s a nit, little Gareth most certainly needs a steadying male influence.

    “Yes,” I admit. “Quite a lot, actually. But at the moment it wouldn’t wash. But I’m bearing it steadily in mind for when he retires, Jack, though ya needn’t shout it around.” –I know he won’t, only reason I’ve mentioned it to him.

    “Don’t worry, I won’t. Only hope she lives to see it,” he notes grimly.

    “Eh? Oh, Lady Mother! Well, I don’t: he’d never waltz off to the other side of the world leaving her on her lonesome with only Fiona and Norman, on the one hand, and Terence on the other, feeble though he is, and a houseful of devoted slaves.”

    He nods grimly, this is all too true. “So didn’t he manage it? –Terence. The cradle.”

    Feeble as he is: no. “No. Well, it hasn’t eventuated. Though he did say that his father seemed keen.”

    Jack just shrugs. We both know that Admiral Sir Father won’t lift a finger if she’s opposed to it. Dunno what sort of fist he made at the admiralling, but he don’t give no orders about nothing in the home environment, that’s for sure.

    “Um, well, I thought the cradle could go in our room…”

    “Mm. Have you made any plans?” he asks mildly.

    “Well, I’ve got stacks of baby clothes, sometimes it seems like every knitter in the world’s been at it, Jack. And I was gonna buy some packets of disposable nappies, but one of the supermarkets I opened when I was doing the series sent me a lifetime’s supply. Most of them are in the cupboard under the stairs.”

    He doesn’t think I’d know a lifetime’s supply, though he’s too nice to say it to my face: he goes to take a look. Comes back wearing the expected feeble grin. “Yeah. You’d better have twins, next time.”

    “What I thought.”

    “What’s all that china doing in there?” he adds feebly.

    I eye him ironically. “Take a look in the kitchen cupboards, Jack.”

    He does. “Jesus!”

    “The flat’s full of it, too. Wedding presents. Well, you were there: all those wanking upper-clawss friends of his coughed up handsomely.

    He sits down groggily. “Yeah. Well, so they bloody well should. Uh, well,”—scratches the dark chin, he’s one of those men with a heavy beard that always have that dark look, y’know?—“you’ve got some Johnson’s baby powder and some baby oil, I saw that.”—He checked out our bathroom cupboards while he was at it, yep.—“Um, look, Rosie,”—slightly desperate but determined—“do you know anybody that’s had a baby recently?”

    “Um, well, Joslynne’s got two kids.”

    “Not in Australia!” the driven man howls. “Here!”

    “Oh! Um, the youngest baby I know’d be Kiefer Dean Jennings, Jack; don’t think Ms Deane Jennings ’ud be into cosy advice to expectant mums, would she?”

    He shudders. “No. Well, have ya got a book, at least?”

    Last resort: yeah. I don’t smile, my background’s not all that different from his, if Dad does read a lot; most of my rellies would take the same attitude. “Mm. Several. All contradicting one another. I went to loads of those classes when I was in town, though. You know: they teach you how to hold it and give it a bath and that, only I already knew all that, what with Joslynne’s two and my cousin Wendalyn’s Sickening Little Taylor. She was quite a nice baby, actually, before Aunty Allyson and Wendalyn got going on her.”

    He sags slightly. “Well, at least you know something,” he mutters.

    “Yeah. I've been round kids all my life, our street was full of young families when we moved in. –’Nother cuppa?”

    Over another cuppa he asks, without hope, if Mum’s decided whether to come over for it.

    “No. Lost her nerve definitively. Dad got her as far as Kingsford Smith, but she burst into floods of tears in the International Terminal, so that was that. The bastards wouldn’t refund the ticket money, either.”

    “Shit.”

    “Yeah. –Don’t look like that, Jack, she can’t help it: it’s a phobia. I’m like that about heights, can’t even stand on chair.”

    He knows that, so he just nods, and eats a biscuit and asks, avoiding my eye: “What about your Aunty Kate?”

    I knew that was coming. “Gee, Jack, I’m praying she’ll forget all about the idea, what are you praying?”

    “I’m praying she’ll come over here and look after you, you silly cow!” he shouts, turning puce.

    Thought ya were, yeah. “Well, she might yet. But Carolyn had to have a cyst removed, so she rushed off to WA to be with here.”

    “Um, Double You Ay?” he echoes doubtfully.

    “Sorry. Western Australia. The Australian dialect assumes that the syllables ‘Doub-le You Ay’ are much, much shorter than ‘West-ern A-stra-ya’. That’s nothing: the abbreviation for ‘Steve’ is Stevo’,” I add kindly.

    “Very funny. Uh—and you haven’t heard from her since?”

    “Only detailed medical reports on Carolyn’s progress. –Benign. The hospitals these days let them go home far too early. And he’s useless, won’t lift a finger round the house, doesn’t know what a bread saw is.”

    “Uh—your Uncle Jim, is this?”

    “No. Though anyone would be forgiven for making the assumption. No, Carolyn’s life-partner that Aunty Kate will never forgive for not having wanted a huge white church wedding back in Adelaide that none of their mutual friends would have been able to get to. Philip.”

    “Is she letting him lift a finger round the house?”

    “Aunty Kate? You must be kidding!”

    He is, he grins like anything. Then it dawns that I’ve successfully side-tracked him and he says crossly: “Look, stop trying to side-track me! You can’t have the bloody kid in the bloody cottage all by yourself! –And don’t dare to mention those two to me,” he warns grimly.

    “Wasn’t gonna. Tim’d be more use than either of them. No, well, it’s not due until mid-September, and John’ll be home before then. And we’re planning to go up to London to my own doctor, actually.”

    He’s looking at the bulge.

    “Look, I can’t help it if it’s this size. The doc said it’s due around the fifteenth of September, okay?’

    “Yeah. No, well, put it like this: if he’s not back P.D.Q. I'll come and stay with you myself. I got Gareth born okay,” he reminds me. He did, too. Steve, of course, was at sea at the time. They had a flat in Portsmouth at that stage but Gareth arrived early, in fact ten minutes before the ambulance did.

    “Um, yeah. Thanks, Jack,” I say weakly.

    “That’s that, then. But you gotta have a cot or a cradle, Rosie! It’s no use thinking that that useless Terence’ll turn up trumps for you!”

    I wasn’t thinking he would. I was wondering, actually, if John might put his foot down with blasted Lady Mother and drive over to the mansion, like what I’ve never seen, folks, and grab it off her. I don’t say this, I know Jack’s reading my mind. “Yeah. Um, well, we could go shopping in Portsmouth, I suppose,” I say weakly.

    “Yes. You’ll need a changing table,” he ordains briskly, “but I can knock one up for you, easy, got a few spare bits of wood lying around the place. And have you got any clothes for it, barring all these knitted sets people keep giving you?”

    “Uh, well, I got lots of creeper suits… Clothes?”

    Apparently it’ll need vests, after a bit I realise he means singlets, and little nightgowns and stuff. I musta missed that class, maybe it was on during one of the weeks I was down here. “Oh.”

    Jack gets out a carpenter’s pencil and goes and grabs a sheet of paper off Greg.—HEY!—A different sheet of paper. And comes back and grimly makes a list.

    “It can’t need all this!”

    “John can afford it,” he says on a sour note.

    Uh—ye-ah… But given what I just put on that credit card… Oh, the Hell with it: he's the one that oughta be taking me shopping for stuff for the sprog, for God’s sake! “Eh?”

    “I said, we’ll get some magazines, might give you some ideas about you want done with that bedroom.”

    “But Imelda only did it up a few months back,” I say feebly.

    Don’t think he even heard me, oh, dear. And given the crush on yours truly I didn’t ought to let him do any of it…

    Two weeks later. Katie looks dazedly round what used to be the blue and white striped and frilled ex-naval bedroom. “It’s a metamorphosis!”

    She can talk. She bowled up in Euan’s new car. When I first met him, incidentally at the previous Mountjoy Midsummer Festival two years back, he was driving the little old Morris Minor that was his first car. Not because he didn’t own a posher one, I subsequently discovered, but because he was very fond of the little old car and often trundled round in it when he wasn't trying to impress anybody or in a great hurry or intending to go on a motorway, actually admitting frankly to me that he’d lost his nerve about going on the M1 in such a small car. He may still own the little old thing but he certainly isn’t driving it this year. What he is driving this year, folks, is a Porsche. Oh, yes. Black, very slick.

    And Katie’s done up to match. Very new, very black sunglasses that match his, really weird-looking: round lenses. They look idiotic. With them, nothing so down-market as those new jeans with the slight flares and the embroidered or simply sewn-on floral strip at the hem. No. Slightly flared they are. Denim, they are not. If I hadda guess I’d say black cotton of the most expensive variety—the phrase “sea island” comes to mind, no idea why. The little abbreviated top is black cotton-knit, scoop-necked, very tight, shows off the bust, shows three centimetres of Katie above the just very slightly lowered and tied-with-a-drawstring waist of the trou’. The phrase “Jennifer Aniston” springs to mind, no idea why: Katie looks nothing like her in either features or figure. Worn negligently open over the top is a gauzy shirt in very dark blue, um, possibly not muslin. Or then again, possibly it is. Very sharp, tailored cuffs which aren’t buttoned, but turned up negligently, and very sharp, tailored collar, very long points to it. The finishing touch is a longish dark blue gauze scarf draped negligently at the neck.

    Under it may be glimpsed three narrow gold wire necklaces, matched set kind of thing. And on each wrist, three gold wire bangles. The footwear consists of very expensive black suede sandals with wooden soles. I happen to know they’re very expensive, because two months since when we buying the terry-claath robes Rupy and me priced them and decided, shuddering, that delicious and slightly Jamaican-casual though they were, especially the ones in the fawn suede, they were a definite no-no. If she took off the daft sunnies possibly the dark blue would bring out the blue of her eyes, yes, but otherwise all it does is highlight the sunburn on her nose, chin and cheeks, did he make her drive all the way down from London with the top down?

    “Didn’t you wear any sunscreen at all?”

    “What? Yes, of course I did, Rosie. Oh—this?” Touches the chin. “We were sunbathing on his balcony the other day, I didn’t realise what a sun-trap is it.” –Is it? Could be, I never went out there, can’t stand heights.

    She does take off the sunnies, and gets an even better look at the metamorphosed bedroom. “Have Rupy and Greg been sleeping in here?”

    The twin beds are still here, so why not? “They did move back in a couple of nights back, yeah. Jack made them sleep downstairs while he was doing the redecorating. Greg had the honourable sofa, since he reckons it's comfortable, and Jack and Rupy both had stretchers, courtesy of Jack.”

    “So, um, whose stretcher bed is it, that’s still down there?” she asks cautiously.

    “Jack’s, of course.”

    “Is he staying here?”

    “Yeah. He doesn’t trust Rupy and Greg to do the sensible thing if the baby comes. It won’t, of course, but I let him anyway. His daughter and his grandson have gone to France for their hols, they had a French lady staying one year as a P.G., so this year they’ve gone to her. Jack didn’t want to go: he hates foreigners.”

    She gives me a sly look. “Australians don’t count, I see.”

    Cough. “Er—no.”

    Our eyes meet. We collapse in giggles.

    “Does John know?” she asks feebly, wiping her eyes.

    “Know what, Katie?”

    We collapse in giggles again.

    “Well, about the redecorating, really,” she admits finally, blowing the nose.

    “Yes, of course. He thoroughly approves and he’s looking forward to seeing the frieze.”

    “Mm, he has done it beautifully.” She looks round admiringly but adds: “Friezes, isn’t it?” and we collapse in giggles again.

    The thing is, Jack got carried away, or perhaps he was carried away from the beginning and I never realised it. Anyway, I know you can buy very nice meant wallpaper friezes, but that’s not what Jack’s are. His friezes go right round the walls twice, one at ceiling level, the kid can stare up at it when its in its cot and blah-blah (have nightmares, right), and the other at eye level if you’re two, the kid can stagger round and blah-blah. With the six coats of polyurethane sticky fingers won’t matter. What he did, see, he dragged me to this posh bookshop in Portsmouth that specialises in children’s books and made me buy enough copies of this frieze book to go right round the room twice plus enough to manage the corners and match it up in the middle—whatever. Like, it unfolds, see? Normal people buy one copy for a christening or birthday or Christmas present, the shop lady thought we were nuts; but I outed with John’s credit card and she shut up. Subsequently the muttering and muffled cursing had to heard to be believed. Greg took him up a cuppa in the middle of it and got told to piss OFF for his pains. After that we left him severely alone. The result looks ace, yes, but will the kid appreciate it? Could any kid?

    Katie’s admiring the corners in a sort of breathless awe. Yep, the corners are extra, he put in some sort of background bit and unless you look really, really closely you can’t see that the pattern isn’t meant to— Forget it, the man’s a fanatic.

    In between the friezes the walls, which used to be plain white plaster, are a very, very pale yellow, a lovely shade, matte finish. The windowsills and surrounds are bright white but he’s picked out the fiddly bits round the tiny panes with a nice clear yellow. The door also being yellow, shiny, and its surround bright white—sure as Hell is an improvement on that dark oak it was before. I don’t think John will mind: he let him do the inside of our bedroom door pale cream earlier in the year.

    As I say, he’s left the beds, but where they used to have their heads against the blank wall to the right as you go in, now one’s pushed right back against that wall and the other’s pushed right back against the opposite wall, and the bassinet’s sort of in the middle of the room (made me buy it in Portsmouth, right). The changing-table he made and painted in edible non-toxic paint, mixed pale yellow and bright yellow, is under the window, and the repainted chest of drawers, against the wall to the left of the door, that used to be plain white and severe, is now very pale blue scattered with fluffy white clouds, it looks dreamy. Over to the right of the door the built-in wardrobe that used to be plain white and severe is very pale yellow to match the walls, and up in the far left-hand corner the dressing table that used to be plain white is very pale blue scattered with fluffy white clouds. And the ceiling that used to be plain white plaster is very pale blue scattered with fluffy white clouds, you goddit.

    He’s left the curtains that Imelda made, that is the inner ones, very frilled blue and white stripes, and the original plain navy outer curtains, and also the original navy duvet covers brightened up by Imelda with wide blue and white striped frills. The small navy rug with its severe narrow white stripe is still there, but banished to the spot in front of the changing table where it’ll be comfortable for me. He made me buy a great big square rug, large checks in pale yellow and white, with a darker yellow surround. It didn’t matter that all the furniture had to be removed in order to lay it over the wide dark oak floorboards because gee, he’d removed it anyway to do the painting.

    After a while Katie manages to croak: “Does Imelda know?” and I thankfully report that she does, she’s very excited about it and has approved it all in absentia and is coming down very soon, in spite of Greg’s attempt to veto any such notion, to see it. With a large teddy bear that she bought with her very own money, Mrs Singh has privily warned me it’s got an awful squint.

    And at this point Euan appears in the doorway and exclaims admiringly: “Well! Isn’t this nice!” And comes in and admires everything in detail and tells us all about Georgy Harris’s little Christopher’s nursery, one of us didn’t wanna know but it wasn’t her. Oh, God.

    His gear is as trendily rich, casual-summertime as hers, only he’s gone the other way, all in just off-white. Floating off-white as to the almost-muslin shirt, possibly natural cotton? Casually draped off-white as to the perfect trou’. Think those are possibly Gucci sandals for rich gents that don’t mind looking poncy— Forget it. He does seems genuinely fond of her, but as you mighta guessed, he is treating her like a dear little doll, yes. And this is generally the consequence of letting a rather older bloke buy bloody fancy clothes for you, what planet is the girl from? –Planet twenty-years-old and besotted, you said it.

    I can see Rupy’s really jealous of the gear, oops, deary. As soon as Euan pushes off I'm gonna bend his ear on exactly the sort of dough that kind of gear sets ya back, and put him off the idea forever.

    And, incidentally, just where is Euan getting all the moolah from? Brian’s advance for the fifth series will not have been all that generous, I can guarantee that. And that arty-tarty film about Old Russia he did for Derry Dawlish, as I think I may have mentioned, is a huge artistic success and a huge commercial failure. Well, he probably did get a decent lump sum for it, yeah. And he has been in pretty regular telly work. But the last Hollywood offer never came to anything. And that huge posh London flat of his by the river is, to my certain knowledge, costing him megabucks which his income just barely covers. Yes, he owns it, but the mortgage would buy several decent little houses in less fashionable areas.

    How do I know all this? In the first place Euan is the type of man that pours out all the details of his financial affairs to the little woman in bed afterwards, because for he’s so relaxed and the little woman doesn’t count, and in the second place he’s the type that leaves his bank statement lying around after he’s politely asked you if you mind if he reads his mail, not expecting the answer No. And I looked at it. Partly because I was afraid he might be getting himself into really deep financial hot water, and partly because the intimate details of other people’s lives, especially the financial ones, are grist to the sociological mill.

    Mum and Dad would’ve had a fit, yeah, regardless of the fact that, if we’re being strictly accurate, neither of them actually taught me better. Did they expect me to absorb it by osmosis? Perhaps they did. Since coming to England and getting to know Dad’s sister, Aunty June, I’ve realised that their nice middle-class background was stiflingly proper, and that that’s the sort of thing they would have absorbed themselves. Only Mum’s a bit different, you see: just a working-class Aussie mum. She’s quite bright, in spite of the incessant bawling, but she left school pretty early: got bored with it and wanted a job and spending-money and fun. And Grandma and Grandpa Leach weren’t the type to object, besides having several other kids to feed and clothe and house. I honestly don’t think it’s ever dawned on Dad that me and Kenny might not have absorbed all the stuff he and Aunty June did. Well, theoretically I know nice people don’t read other people’s bank statements—yeah.. But I didn’t have a single twinge of guilt over it—geddit? Thoughtcha might of, yeah.

    Later. Is Euan ever gonna push off? We've given them lunch, inviting Velda Cross over for it, since she’s expressed a wish to meet him—saw him in that gloomy almost-Dickens serial a few years back—and listened to more stories about little Christopher McIntyre, and got The Word on what the famous producer-director Derry Dawlish is up to, gee, wanted to know that, and duly accepted laughing compliments on Jamaica in Hampshire (? could be, don’t ask me), and heard more about the wanking Festival… He asked very nicely how the nationalism study is going, but my report didn’t take long.

    In desperation I suggest a stroll along the beach, so we all get up. Rupy and me adjust our Blues Brothers shades, and put on our big straw hats, since it’s Jamaica. So Euan, as I said he’s the sort that conforms madly to the norms of the group he’s with, promptly assumes the panama. Rupy’s dying of envy, it’s off-white to match the rest of the gear, where did he get it? Jesus God Almighty, at a boutique in Bond Street that Adam McIntyre recommended! What is this, mid-life crisis? I take a deep breath.

    “Euan, does Georgy still let Adam shop at this boutique?”

    “E-er… well, no, actually, Rosie!” Silly laugh.

    “Then why chuck megabucks in its direction for silly gear, however delish, that you don’t need?”

    “Isn’t she direct?” he says to Katie with another silly laugh. “She’s always been like that, you know! I didn’t really have any summer clothes, Rosie, darling. So I gave myself the treat of buying something really nice.”

    “Um, it was quite a small shop,” Katie puts in uneasily.

    “Katie, it was Bond Street: the rent a small shop there would be up for would be more than ten times our combined annual incomes! I mean it!”

    “Not ten,” she says uncertainly.

    “Ten. How the fuck much was that hat?” I demand angrily.

    “None o’ your business, wee Mother Hen!” he says with a laugh.

    “Everyone likes a treat now and then, Rosie,” Rupy puts in. At least he’s eyeing the bloody hat askance, instead of slavering over it.

    “Yes, but those whose plastic is not infinitely expandable find themselves in very hot water when it turns out their bank won’t subsidise their little treats. Or have you been offered a huge Hollywood contract that your publicist has failed to tell the world about?”

    “Nothing o’ the sort, thank God!” He embarks on a long, rambling story about how deadly dull it is churning out tripe for Hollywood. Velda and Katie both listen breathlessly. Greg listens with a look on his face that says he doesn’t believe a word of it. It is all true, actually, everyone who’s ever made a movie for Hollywood says the same thing. After a bit Rupy comes and takes my arm and leads me away from it.

    “It won’t do any good, Rosie.”

    “What? Oh. Actually I wasn’t saying it in order to wean Katie off him, this time, I was genuinely worried that he’d gone potty. You know: early male menopause or something? He hasn’t got the dough for hats from Bond Street and Vogue gear for this summer’s male model, not to mention what he must have spent on Katie: not on top of the Porsche!”

    “No-o… Possibly bought the Porsche with a big loan, dear?”

    “Well, exactly! Big loans have to be paid for, or the big bank comes along and takes away your posh bachelor pad.”

    He bites his lip. “Mm. Um… Well, spending to impress her, dear?”

    “She’s not that sort, and she hasn’t got a clue how much that gear she’s wearing woulda set him back! Evidently he made it all a sort of joke: cosy shopping expedition, they bought silly things like a toy pig—stuffed, you clot!—and one of those kitschy lamps with the coloured bubbles rising and falling, and like that! And he slipped the gear in, see?”

    He makes an awful face. “I see. But, um, the jewellery, darling?”

    “Didn’t make the mistake of taking her to a jeweller’s shop, Rupy, he’s too canny for that. Presented it to her wrapped in brown paper, told her he got it from a flea market.”

    “And she doesn't know the difference? Uh, no: silly me, of course she doesn’t. Help.”

    “Help was my cry too,” I say grimly.

    He squeezes my arm really hard into his side. “Perhaps he really has fallen for her?”

    “Um, he’s certainly trying hard enough… Dunno. Don’t think he sees the real Katie Herlihy, Rupy. More the pretty little doll that comes out with cute sayings every so often. Well, same thing he tried to do with me, even though he knew I was a sociologist.”

    “Ye-es… Look, you’re failing to take into account the fact that you both are, well, little and curved female persons, darling, to be strictly literal.”

    Sigh. Possibly I am failing to, yeah.

    “If I was you, I’d have a little talk with her. Explain that he’s gone slightly overboard and make very sure she doesn’t let him chuck his money away in future.”

    “Good idea. She’s certainly got enough common sense for both of them. Uh—well, when she’s in a normal state. Only has she gone into an abnormal state that’s gonna last for the next few years?”

    “Ugh. Well, try it, Rosie.”

    “Yes, I will. And meantime, try sending Velda thought-rays on the subject of not offering the pair of them a room for the night, wouldja? Because if she does, we’re never gonna get rid of him.”

    Later. He swears he did send the thought rays, but it didn’t work.

    Two days have passed. They’re still with Velda. Well, it’s company for her, because, as if ya didn’t know, Duncan’s still at sea with John. Rupy thinks Euan his changed for the better. Even Greg can see that this might just be a rôle that he’s playing for the summer. Like, rather protective and uxorious cosy Euan that’s still Helluva sexy and slightly sophisticated with it, but joins readily and happily in down-market barbies on the beach and daft Jamaican lunches under the sun-umbrellas and helps Velda fix those shelves that Duncan never got around to—blimey, never knew he could hold a hammer—and comes round in an old pair of jeans of Duncan’s, my God he looks good, he’s lost quite a bit of weight, and helps Jack and Greg to dig over the back garden and dig in the compost where Jack reckons it oughta be dug…

    Rupy's had the sense to keep well out of that lot. After spying for a bit out of the kitchen window he comes to report: “Working way with a will. Sweat pouring off the manly form and all.”

    “Hope he’s has the sense to put on plenty of sunscreen.”

    “Mm. Um, very busy, darling?”

    Being as how I’ve got my head in my computer, that is a stupid question. “Yeah. Well, seriously considering whether the expense of hiring a professional indexer’d be worth it.”

    “Yes,” he says instantly. “Total waste of your brains and energy, dear.”

    “You’re right. I’ll give the publishers a ring.” I do, and they’re only too pleased to recommend someone. Thank God! A great weight has lifted.

    “Feel better now, darling?”

    “Much, much. Well, still not entirely satisfied with the introductory chapter…”

    “Leave it. Come out for a nice drinkie-poo.”

    “Is there any pineapple j—”

    Buckets of it, dear. So we do that.

    … Boy, is that better! This bulge is getting awfully heavy to cart around. Velda took me in to her doc in Portsmouth yesterday and the word is, I’m very well, the bulge is doing splendidly, all is going to schedule, and I should put my feet up more, the last month is always tiring. Academic work? Well, I mustn’t overdo it.

    “Greg’s volunteered to proof-read it,” I tell Rupy as we relax, me on the swing seat and him in a hammock with his panama tilted over his nose.

    “Mm? Oh, good show. Lovely boy, isn’t he? Why on earth the girl didn’t look twice at him is beyond me.”

    “Yeah. And this is the same Katie Herlihy that wasn’t gonna be dazzled by show biz,” I remind him.

    “Mm? Oh, so it is. Well, she isn’t, though, is she? Only by him.”

    How true…

    “He’s offered to make the dinner, dear.”

    I hurl my empty glass in the air. “Don’t do that! Uh—what?”

    “Euan. Offered to singe the steaks and snarlers on the barbie this evening, dear.”

    “Going too far,” I yawn.

    “Mm… Jack’ll put hm right."

    “Sure to…”

    Musta dozed off, because here’s Katie with a cardy for me, asking me if hadn't better come in and have a shower before dinner. Well, not a bad way to spend a summer afternoon.

    Boy, talking of metamorphoses, I feel a new person, now that I don’t have to look forward to indexing the ruddy thing myself! Uh—creak and groan, thanks, Katie! –Grabbing her arm. Almost a new person.

    “Euan says that Georgy got very tired in the last month,” she says on an anxious note.

    “Yeah. Well, I’ve taken Rupy’s advice and given in and hired a professional indexer,” I admit.

    “Oh, good!”

    “Yeah.”

    She accompanies me upstairs so I take the opportunity to haul her into the bedroom and say: “Katie, I know Euan’s behaving himself and being very sweet, but, um, lots of actors continually play rôles, whether or not they mean to, and, um, well, just don’t run away with the idea that he’s always gonna be like this, will you?”

    She sits down on the bed very slowly. “No,” she says, after a while. “Half the time I’m so—um, so excited, I suppose, that I can’t think.”

    I know exactly what she means. ”Yeah, like, you feel all warm and tingly all the way through, something like that?”

    “Um, yes,” she says, going very pink. “Only kind of at the back of it, I can see all that, that you said.”

    Blimey. You mean there’s two of us whose minds don’t stop working in spite of all our female hormones can do?

    “Um, I did sort of almost convince myself that he was really in love with me,” she admits, licking her lips. “But I can see he’s just rôle-playing.”

    Gulp. “Um, yeah. Just, um, try and enjoy the moment, Katie. Don’t try and—and build it up into something it’s not gonna be.”

    “Yes,” she says, sticking that determined chin out. “I am trying.”

    Yeah. Trying but it’s almost bloody impossible—right. I don't say it, it’s more than I ever envisaged or hoped for, frankly. Thought she’d completely metamorphosed into a bedazzled little doll. Phew!