Episode
8: The Captain’s Baby
No, well, possibly a grandmother that bawls
unendingly all the way from Australia and a grandfather that complains
unendingly all the way from Australia about what the bawling’s costing him are
preferable to the other side. They have been to see us, yes. Dunno that I want
to dwell on it. Well, it might be cathartic. Put it like this, if I put it in
terms of a visit by the Captain’s Mother and Father to the Captain’s Baby, it
might be. Just.
The door-phone buzzes.
CAPTAIN
That must be them!
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(thinks: Pity.)
CAPTAIN
(mixed hope and anxiety)
Now, darling, sit up nicely, and pull your night-gown
up around your shoulders.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE’S AUNT
(officiously)
Let me, Rosie.
She
bustles about getting unnecessary frilled
and lacy bed-jacket out of
the
chest of drawers and forcing it on the victim.
Captain exits.
Come up!
Noises
O.S.: buzz,
crackle.
CAPTAIN (O.S.)
Father, is that you? I’m opening the door now!
Time
passes. Enter Captain, Captain’s Mother,
looking cool in well-cut grey
tweeds
and a blue neck-scarf, and Captain’s
Father, looking flushed in well-cut
brown
tweeds and an Old School tie.
Captain’s Mother
(coolly)
Really, John, I do think you could do something
about that front door. How much are you paying for
this place?
Captain’s Father looks
eagerly into bassinet.
CAPTAIN’S MOTHER
(coolly)
Well, Rosie, my dear, how are you? You’re looking
well.
She bends,
salutes the air ten inches from Captain’s Wife’s cheek.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(feebly)
Hullo. Um, this is my Aunty Kate.
Captain’s Mother
(coolly)
Of course. How are you, Kate?
CAPTAIN’S WIFE’S AUNT
(feebly, for once in her life)
How do you do, Lady Haworth?
CAPTAIN
(cheerfully)
I’m sorry, Kate! Mother’s name’s Miriam. –Father,
come and say Hullo to Rosie and Kate.
CAPTAIN’S FATHER
(extra-jovially)
Of course, of course! Just taking a peek at the
nipper! How are you, Rosie, my dear? Well done!
(bends, salutes Captain’s Wife’s cheek
heartily)
And this is Kate, eh? Gather we owe you a fair bit,
Kate!
(shakes hands heartily with Captain’s Wife’s
dumbfounded Aunt)
So, what are you going to call him, John?
He goes
over to bassinet, looks into it
eagerly again.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE’S AUNT
(recovering slightly)
They haven’t decided yet, um, Bernard. You can
pick him up, if you like, he’s had a good nap.
CAPTAIN’S FATHER
(mixed eagerness and fear)
Er, well, bit out of practice, y’know! –I say, come
and look at him, Miriam!
Captain,
Captain’s Mother and Captain’s Wife’s Aunt all join him at the bassinet.
CAPTAIN
(proudly)
Let me do it, Father.
(picks baby up)
There!
(misguidedly)
What do you think of him, Mother?
CAPTAIN’S MOTHER
(coolly)
Very nice, dear. Your father’s so glad it’s a boy.
(mixed agony and pride)
Yes, a fine boy!
Captain
hands him the baby.
CAPTAIN’S FATHER
Er, well, you sure, John?
(taking the baby)
There, now! What a fine little fellow, eh? What a fine
little fellow! –I say, John, I think he’s got the
Haworth nose!
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(involuntarily)
Help! Poor little sprat!
CAPTAIN’S MOTHER
(sniffs very faintly)
Quite. I’ve always been glad that at least one of my
sons missed it.
She
sits down on visitor’s chair at a little distance
from Captain’s Wife’s bed.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(feebly)
Yes, Terence has got a nice nose. But the family
nose looks good on John.
CAPTAIN’S MOTHER
(coolly)
Well, yes, now that he’s grown into it. But it was
fairly disastrous when he was in his teens. The boys
at school called him Durante for a while.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(unguardedly)
Help, not really? The poor little soul! No wonder he
doesn’t want Baby Bunting to go there!
A
sticky silence prevails.
Captain’s Mother
(coldly)
I meant his public school.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(mixed agony and guilt)
Um, yeah, so did I.
CAPTAIN’S MOTHER
(coldly)
I think you must be mistaken, my dear. John, surely—
CAPTAIN
(quickly)
Yes, but never mind that now, Mother. He may want
to go there, when he’s old enough to choose.
Captain’s Father
(foggily)
Eh, what? Choose? What are you on about, John?
Of course he’ll go to the old school!
(in a bass coo: to the baby)
Won’t you, old chap? Eh? Eh?
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(mixed agony and defiance)
No, he won’t, Sir Bernard. It sounds really horrible,
and John was miserable there! And I don’t want him
growing up into a man who doesn’t know what girls
are!
Captain’s Mother
(coldly)
John never had that problem, I do assure you.
CAPTAIN’S Father
(foggily)
Eh, what? No, ’course he didn’t! Look here, Rosie,
me dear, you’ve got the wrong end of the stick!
(comes gingerly over to bed, carrying baby)
And I thought we agreed you were going to call me
Bernard, eh?
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(feebly)
Um, yeah, Bernard. Sorry—forgot. Um, shall I take
him?
CAPTAIN’S FATHER
(cheering up)
Of course, my dear, of course! Here we go!
He hands
baby to her.
Thanks.
(grimly)
And my brain is
not addled because I’m a nursing
mum!
CAPTAIN’S WIFE’S
AUNT
(hurriedly)
That’ll do, Rosie.
And it’s far too soon to start talking
about schools:
you haven’t even chosen a name for
him, yet!
CAPTAIN
(mildly)
No, that’s quite right, Kate. –We did think of
‘Bernard’, Father.
(cheering up even more)
Good Lord, y’don’t want to land the poor little fellow
with a handle like that!
He pulls
up a visitor’s chair very close
to bed, and sits.
CAPTAIN’S FATHER
(continues: very jovially)
Now, Patrick’s a nice name, I’ve always thought!
CAPTAIN’S MOTHER
(acidly)
He wanted to call Terence that. It’s an Irish name,
Bernard, it would be quite impossible, you know
that.
Captain’s
Wife’s Aunt, taken unawares,
swallows; avoids everybody’s eye.
No, well, that was the best and the worst
of it, so to speak. Nothing very vile happened but nothing very good happened,
either. They let Aunty Kate force a cup of tea on them but Lady Mother refused
absolutely to let her serve anything to eat, even though, as it was
mid-afternoon, she’d prepared an immense spread in the good old Aussie
tradition of giant afternoon teas that nobody needs. They’re not so common
these days, but Mum can remember tremendous spreads when she was a kid, back in
the Fifties. Towering sponges as light as air, giant chocolate cakes, terrible
competition over who could produce the best scones and date loaf, Mrs Minter
from down the road being almost ostracised because she dared to serve a date
loaf bought at the local school fair that everyone recognised instantly as one
of Mrs French’s with the finely chopped walnuts and the nutmeg. Not claiming it
as her own, you understand: merely daring to serve it… Thank God I was born
into this generation and not Grandma’s, I’d’ve gone barking mad. On second
thoughts, possibly it explains why she has. Well, not barking. Totally gaga,
however.
When they took themselves off John let Tim
out of the study, hopefully Lady Mother had no idea he was even in London with
us, dogs are allowed in the house only if they keep off the furniture and sleep
in their basket, kept on the cold kitchen lino, and most definitely not allowed
in bedrooms. And the idea of being allowed on the bed is so far beyond the pale
that she’d probably be unable to believe that John is letting me let him, even
though she does fully realise what a rotten influence I am. –None of this has
ever been verbalised, you understand. Nevertheless it’s all bloody clear.
And I was just suggesting to Aunty Kate
that it’d be a pity to waste that afternoon tea so let’s have it, and why not
ask Miss Winslow and Miss Hammersley over for it, when the door-phone buzzed
again, and it was Gray from Della’s Dance Studio with Arthur Morrissey and Vanessa,
friends from the tap class me and Rupy used to go to, and Arthur’s Mum. This
time the dialogue was a bit different.
(shouting)
Let them in!
CAPTAIN (O.S.)
(laughing)
Aye, aye, sir! –Come up, Gray!
Time
passes. Enter Captain with four visitors: Gray
(40-ish), very wiry and fit, gay,
very
short maroon bristles below the bald patch, discreet touch of eyeliner, looking
excited,
in a terribly casual tweed jacket with giant leather patches on the elbows,
well-cut
grey flannel bags, hugely punched and fringed brogues, and a blue neck-
scarf,
Arthur (mid-30s), pale, pudgy,
amiable, looking thrilled, in a fawn anorak
open
over an intricate fawn Aran-knit jumper and baggy black tracksuit pants, Mrs
Morrissey (Arthur’s
Mum) (late 50s?), looking thrilled, in a long fawn gabardine
raincoat
and green crocheted hat with a sparkly thing on it, and Vanessa (age
anybody’s
guess), tall, blonde, used to be a Jim, looking thrilled and fab, the hair
newly
bleached platinum, in a bright blue wool suit with a giant sparkly thing on the
lapel,
sheer black tights, very high-heeled blue shoes, and a to-die-for quilted blue
velvet
bag with gold shoulder chain.
The
visitors all speak at once.
(speaking simultaneously)
Rosie, darling! Congratulations!
ARTHUR
(speaking simultaneously)
Hullo, Rosie! How are you?
MRS MORRISSEY
(speaking simultaneously)
Hullo, Rosie, dear. Hope it's not inconvenient.
VANESSA
(speaking simultaneously)
Rosie, sweetheart! So thrilled!
(mops eyes)
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(eagerly)
Hullo! It’s so lovely to see you all!
They
all come over to the bed and shower her
with gifts.
MRS MORRISSEY
(dubiously; looks from Captain to Captain’s
Wife’s Aunt)
We thought we’d just pop in to see how you are.
ARTHUR
(quickly)
And the baby, Mum!
MRS MORRISSEY
That goes without saying, Arthur. Well, there he is, I
dare say you can look. If it’s not inconvenient, dear?
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
Of course it’s not inconvenient!
Arthur
goes over to the bassinet.
ARTHUR
(eagerly)
Ooh, isn’t he lovely!
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(opens Mrs Morrissey’s present)
Gosh, thank you, Mrs Morrissey, you shouldn’t
have: you’ve already made me that wonderful
shawl! Look, John, a little jacket, isn’t it sweet? And
it’s a lovely card!
(puts card on bedside table; opens Gray’s
present)
Ooh, yum! My absolute favourites, Gray, you’re an
angel!
Gray
bridles pleasedly.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(continues)
Look, John, Gray’s brought me some chocolate
cherries!
(opens Arthur’s present)
Ooh: Busman’s Honeymoon! I’ve been dying to
read it again! Thanks very much, Arthur! But how on
earth did you find it?
ARTHUR
(looks up from baby; bridles pleasedly):
Heck, it was nothing, Rosie. I just went into Smith’s,
and the man said of course he’d heard of it.
Mrs
Morrissey sniffs slightly.
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(continues; smells Vanessa’s mixed roses
and carnations rapturously)
Mm! Wonderful, Vanessa! But you shouldn’t have!
VANESSA
(bridling)
No, well, actually, dear, I got them off Len: he let
me have them for quite a good price.
(looks significant)
ARTHUR
(looks up from baby)
She’s thinks he's coming round to the whole idea,
Rosie!
MRS MORRISSEY
That’ll do, Arthur. And you needn’t thank me for the
little jacket, Rosie, dear, the wool was going spare.
It’ll do him for everyday, you don’t want to use those
pretty sets your mum and aunties sent for everyday.
And this is your Aunty Kate, is it?
CAPTAIN
(hurriedly)
Of course! Let me introduce you all.
ARTHUR
(admiring baby again)
Look, Vanessa, he’s lovely!
MRS MORRISSEY
(sharply)
Really, Arthur! Where are your manners? Come
and be introduced to Rosie’s aunty!
CAPTAIN’S WIFE
(happily)
Yes, and then we can all have afternoon tea! We
were just going to have it, when you arrived!
Well, that’s probably given you an idea of
how it went. They all admired the baby like anything and everybody had to hold
him and Vanessa cried. And we rang Doris and Miss Hammersley and the afternoon
tea was duly appreciated by all. And Arthur got Aunty Kate’s recipe for a
ginger and apricot loaf off her. Setting the seal on everyone’s pleasure.
When they’d gone Aunty Kate of course
bustled out to the kitchen forbidding John to raise a finger, so he came and
collapsed on the edge of the bed and looked at me limply.
“John, if you’re gonna say anything about
Vanessa—”
“No, I’ve got used to her. I thought she
was looking better than she did at our wedding.”
“Yes, she’s got over that post-op
depression, and she’s put on a bit of weight. I think Len will give in
and marry her, in the end. Well, he’s past the age of wanting children.”
Short pause. Then he says pointedly: “I
won’t ask.”
“He’s older than you!”
“I just said I won’t ask. What in God’s
name was all that about Busman’s Honeymoon?”—Picking it up.—“It is a
D.L. Sayers, I thought so.”
“I was moaning on to Arthur about how I’d
left all mine at home and I really wanted to re-read it.”
“Darling, you’re a member of a huge univ—”
“Don’t be stupid, a library book’s not the
same!”
“Apparently not. Er… No, doesn’t clarify it
for me, darling, there were some very strange, er, vibes there.”
“‘Er vibes’ to you, too! Don’t be so ruddy
upper-clawss! Um, yeah, well, they’re not the sort of people who buy books, ya
see. Don’t you remember that time we met on the train?”
“That first trip! Of course I do, darling,
I remember every instant of it! Uh—hang on. The magazines! Of course! Arthur
had bought them for you.”
“Yeah, that was the month Dame Barbara
Cartland and old Sir John Gielgud popped off, most of them had articles about
her with the same pics. Well, you see, he would of had to work up his courage
and find a real bookshop, and then work up his courage and actually go in, and
even worse, speak to the person behind the counter about a book.”
“Er— Oh! Three lots of working up his
courage? I see.” He looked down at the paperback book and bit his lip. “It
makes Father’s hefty cheque for Baby Bunting’s future look pretty damned sick,”
he admitted.
“Well, it might do if you didn’t know the
circumstances and the personalities, John, yeah. Only people do what they’re
capable of, don’t they? And what their upbringing’s taught them is the right
thing for the occasion.”
“Do they?” he said with a twisted smile “I
suppose you’re right, sweetheart. But I’m absolutely convinced Mrs Morrissey
went out and bought three different coloured wools especially for this dear
little jacket.”
“No! You don't know her!” I said with a laugh.
“She doesn’t tell polite lies. It was the literal truth. See the red stripes?
That’ll’ve been left over from the scarf and mittens she made for their Josie’s
Harry, he’s four.”
“Um, didn’t you say her daughter’s name was
Maureen?”
The elephant never forgets. “Maureen’s the
eldest, she still lives in London. Josie lives somewhere up north, her hubby
owns a corner shop, like Mr Machin’s. Um… Is Lincoln a place, like, not just in
Lincoln green?”
Being more or less used to my geographical
ignorance, he was able to take this on the chin. “Yes, quite a large town.”
“Lincoln, then. They don’t see much of her
but she sometimes rings up.”
“Mm. Er—Rosie, those chocolates Gray
brought have probably got alcohol in them.”—I handed him the box.—“Yes. You
really shouldn’t—”
“Look, I’ve just spent nine months off the
grog! I’ll eat them after I’ve fed Baby Bunting, not before, okay?”
He conceded that’d be okay, meantime I was
deciding it’d be feed him and eat a choc—no, two, too delish to stop at one—until
they were all gone. I grabbed the box back off him before it could occur that a
polite person, seeing him sitting there with their box of chocs in his hand,
would offer him one.
“I’d have got you some if I’d known they
were your favourites,” he said on a wan note. Oh, dear. Poor darling John. Bad
enough having the pair of them for parents without having the specific contrast
with normal people shoved under his nose. Well, Arthur and his Mum are very
normal, and if Gray and Vanessa aren’t the norm, precisely, except for their
own demographic groups, they sure are normal compared to icy Lady Mother and
lily-livered Father Sir Admiral!
So I just said mildly: “It never occurred
to me to tell you. And if it had done, I wouldn’t of, see, because it woulda
made me look greedy. Well, even greedier than I am.”
He put his hand on my knee and squeezed it
through the bedclothes. “Silly one,” he said dully.
Yikes. Was this post-natal
depression, or something? Transferred? Sympathetic? I was at a loss for words—yeah,
for one of the very few times in my life—and just looked at him limply.
Eventually he said: “Father was very struck,
I thought.”
“’Course he was! And it’s not your mother’s
fault if she’s not a clucky sort of woman.” –Trying to be comforting without
going over the top, y’know?
“Rosie, even Paula O’Reilly from Henny Penny
was clucking over him,” he said, biting the lip again.
Oh, God. “Um, John, she does the
hard-bitten female exec thing, in D.L. Sayers’s time she’d have had a gasper
sticking out the corner of her mouth, but she’s pretty soft underneath it.
Well, she’s dotty on her nice Jack.”
“Is she?” he said, trying to smile. “That’s
nice, darling.”
I just sat there like a pudding, smiling
unconvincingly and hoping to God he wouldn’t bring up the points that Brian and
Penny donated a huge pale lemon and chocolate pram, rather old-fashioned in
style but I don’t think Brian had the show in mind, it’s not a Fifties pram,
Aunty Kate reckons they were more like wheeled battleships, and that his
sister, Fiona, and Norman, the hen-pecked hubby, donated a lovely pale blue
carrycot (think she probably put in a tentative order to Harrods for a pale
blue one and a pale pink, if ya get my drift) plus and pale blue blankets and
little sheets and stuff for it. Kinda the sorta things loving grandparents,
specially the ones that were thinking they were never gonna get a family heir,
would normally donate, if ya get my drift? Yeah.
“Brian and Penny—”
“Yes. We know. They’re both desperate for
grandchildren, John, and The Captain’s Daughter’s made megabucks for
Brian, and really put the firm on the map. And they’ve got the dough.”
“And they’re very generous people, mm.”
“Well, your Father’s cheque was humungous,
John, you can’t say that’s not generous!”
“No. –He did say he’d drop the cradle over
at the cottage the next time we’re down there,” he reported on a dubious note.
Right,
he’ll of said it in front of her, will he? Folks, I’m not exaggerating simply
because she doesn’t like yours truly. Besides snatching the cradle back off
John when she found out Matt wasn’t his, which woulda been when he was about four
or five (John and Father had to give her a short lesson in elementary genetics,
that musta made the scene really good), she refused to see any more of the poor
little tyke. You can understand any mother-in-law being wild with the bitch of
a daughter-in-law, but refusing to let the little boy come and visit the people
he thought were his grandparents? Terence reckons Matt hasn’t laid eyes on her
from that day to this, and personally I see no reason to doubt his word.
Admiral Sir Father of course gave in to her overtly, but behind her back he
used to get on down to Matt’s school and take him out for weekends when John
was at sea, and nip over to the cottage whenever Matt was staying there.
“Good,” I said, trying to look as if I
believed it.
John just smiled feebly at me. A proper
Navy wife like supreme Noël’s in that daft film would have known how to react,
of course, but dumb Rosie just sat there like a pudding for some time. Finally
in desperation I bleated: “You wanna hug Gladly Teddy?”
He bit the lip yet again. “I look
that down, do I, Rosie?”
“Um, well, pretty much. Maybe it’s
post-natal depression, like, sympathetic? Transferred?”
“Is there such a thing?”
“Dunno. Um, well, do ya feel drained and
bluish and not like you fancy anything much and a bit as if the whole world was
pressing on ya shoulders? You know, a bit like the flu?”
Could I be applying this seriously to a
Royal Naval Officer? Of course not! He gave me a narrow look and said: “Rosie,
are you feeling all right?”
“John, will you LISTEN to me? Actually
listen to the WORDS that proceed from my MOUTH?”
He blinked. “Sorry.”
“I’m perfectly all right. I’m not gonna
claim I’m over the American crisis, or even that I’m dealing with it, except if
you call crying a bit in front of the telly every day dealing with it, but
that’s natural, isn’t it? That apart, I feel distinctly pudding-like, incapable
of making any crucial decision, like, for instance, between a slice of Aunty
Kate’s delicious sponge cake or her magnificent apricot loaf, or one of those
stuck-together biscuits, think she calls them kisses or something, and very
warm and happy—geddit?”
He nodded meekly.
“Yeah. I’m asking you if you feel
all right?”
This time he chewed on the lip, oh, shit.
It is an eminently chewable-on lower lip, being rather full and wide, but
nevertheless I’d much rather not see him do it, poor lamb.
“I’m all right. A bit blue, I suppose. I
did expect—no, well, hope: I did hope that Mother might show some enthusiasm.”
“If a person doesn’t like babies they can’t
make themselves, John. Terence says she’s never been the maternal type.”
“You don’t resent it, then?” he said
uneasily.
Naval nong! “I resent the fact that I
haven’t got a mother-in-law that’s the perfect clucky grandmother, I suppose;
but on the other hand that type’d try to take him over, lock, stock and barrel,
and I’d hate that. I don’t resent the fact that your specific Mother can’t
cluck over Baby Bunting, it’s not her nature to cluck. I’m not saying I like
her; it wouldn’t be human nature to like her when she clearly loathes and
resents me, but I do understand her. And I even sympathise with her, when I
look at all it from her point of view.”
“That’s very generous, darling,” he said
uneasily.
“No, it isn’t, you Royal naval clot. That’s
my nature, see? I usually see people as they are, and when ya do that
it’s hard to resent them for what they can’t help and half the time, no, most
of the time, don’t realise themselves. Goes with the sociology, John: I thought
you knew I was like that?”
“I suppose I did,” he said slowly.
“Well, you told me you didn’t like me
objectifying you,” I reminded him.
“Uh—did I? Oh, so I did,” he said, going
rather red, I wasn’t totally displeased to see.
“This is the flip side, see?”—He just
looked blank.—“Um, the up side? Like, the other side of the coin?”
“Oh! Sorry, I was blank for a moment,
there. I suppose it is the up side, yes. Many women,” he said with a twist of
the lips, “would have collapsed in tears of rage by this point, I feel,
darling.”
Thinks: He oughta know: he was sure enough
married to one. Well, it was ages ago: he was only twenty-five when they got
married and Sonya, who incidentally was about three years older than him, was
very, very pretty. Also buttered him up like anything—I’ve long since got the
gory details out of Terence. The bitch gave him the eye, too, even
though he was little more than a kid at the time, being seven years younger than
John.
“Yeah, only I’m a sociologist and a
fellow,” I reminded him.
“Mm,” he said, blinking—shit, was he gonna
cry? He held out his hand to me so I gave him Gladly Teddy.
“Idiot,” he said, with a laugh that didn’t
come off. “I think I’d rather hug my wife than Gladly Teddy.”
“Come on, then.”
He came and perched beside me and put his
arm round me.
“I wouldn’t call that a hug.”
“No.” His fingers were digging into my arm,
ow! “Don’t want to bawl.”
“I won’t mind,” I said mildly.
He made a face and mouthed: “She’ll be in here
like a shot if I do.”
“You betcha.”
At that he gave another laugh that didn’t
come off and put his head on my shoulder.
We had two seconds and then Aunty Kate
bustled in. “I thought so! Drink this, John,”—handing him a tumbler of whisky.—“I
wouldn’t worry about that pair of old sillies.”
Omigod! I’d never of believed that even
Aunty Kate would up and say that to his face!
“And you needn’t sit there gawping, Rosie
Haworth. You know I believe in calling a spade a spade.”
“More
like a bloody shovel,” I muttered.
“That’s enough.” –Quite tolerantly, oddly
enough. “They need time to get used to it all. And Miriam’s obviously the sort
of woman who can’t take an interest in infants, very like Mrs Freed.”
What? She’s nothing like Mrs Freed! Mrs
Freed is about six-foot-four and weighs seventeen stone if an ounce! With the
mo’ to match. Lady Mother’s about five-nine, five-ten, very thin and elegant,
beautiful white hair, beautiful straight nose for looking down.
“Not in looks,” she said tolerantly. “She
never could take an interest in Loyola and Narelle and Vernie when they were
little, that's all I mean. But it was her that got Loyola through secondary school,
and encouraged Narelle to take up nursing. That idiot Christine Freed was too
soft to even make sure they did their homework.”
John was staring at her in fascination, his
upbringing was of course nothing like these snippets that my side continually
reveals to him. “And Vernie?”
Sniff. “Put it like this, John: it wasn’t
George or Christine that paid for his music lessons all those years.”
“He’s in the symphony orchestra, John,” I
explained feebly. “Um, woodwind.”
“First clarinet,” she clarified briskly.
“He’s making quite a good living. He plays in some jazz group, too.”
“Narelle’s a theatre sister in one of the
big Sydney hospitals,” I contributed feebly.
“I see. And—uh—Loyola?” –Not quite
believing that even an Aussie would name their kid that.
Aunty Kate just gave me a bland look so I
was forced to admit: “I’m forced to admit that that’s the greatest success
story of the last quarter century, John. She did a law degree, topped her year,
and got into a huge posh downtown Sydney law firm, and is now a partner at—um—thirty-five,
would she be, Aunty Kate?”
“Thirty-seven. She was thirty-three when
she made partner,” she replied with huge satisfaction. “And before you ask,
she’s happily married”—he wasn’t gonna ask, from the cowed look on his face—“to
a university lecturer, and they’ve got two of their own, now. –What is it he
teaches, again, Rosie?”
She’s forgotten? Blow me down flat. “Australian
history. He was offered at job in Canberra, at ANU, that’s like the top history
department, only they decided they couldn’t swing the commuting, it wouldn’t be
sensible even if there is a red-eye special every night and morning. Um, sorry,
John, do ya want a translation?”—He did, funnily enough.—“Well, see, Canberra’s
real close to Sydney, we coulda done it easy in a day if you’d of been
interested, only there’s not that much to see, it’s bloody boring. Where was I?
Oh, yeah. The red-eye’s the plane that leaves at crack of dawn so as people can
get to their desks by nine in the morning, see? And conversely, get home in
time for tea—dinner. And of course he could’ve had a flat and just come home
for weekends, only that woulda meant not seeing so much of his kids. Um, when I
say real close to Sydney, that’s in our terms,” I ended feebly.
“Of course, darling. Well, that is a
success story!” he said with a laugh—mind you, the whisky coulda had something
to do with it, by the colour of it she’d given him the really good stuff.
“We’ll look forward to the time when Baby Bunting shows signs of developing an
intellect and needs encouragement to do his homework and plan his career,
then!”
Yeah, won’t we? Pity your ruddy Mother, unlike
old Mrs Freed, has never opened a book since she left school. Too busy planning
lovely little bridge parties for other Navy wives. I refrained from saying any
of that, and he drank his whisky up and looked much happier, inspected Baby
Bunting, reported he was fast asleep, and decided they’d better let me sleep.
Well, coulda been a lot worse, on the
whole, couldn’t it? I mean, he could of stiffened up alarmingly when she said
his parents were a pair of old sillies. Which, lemme add, his upbringing has
more than encouraged him to do. Nevertheless, it’s very clear by now to both me
and Aunty Kate that he’s very, very dished that his bloody Mother doesn’t think
our Baby Bunting’s the marvel of the new Millennium. Silly cow. She might of at
least pretended. He’s always adored her (and vice versa, never mind not
being the clucky type, nothing’s too good for the blue-eyed boy), but does she
imagine, because he managed to forgive her rejection of Matt, he’s gonna go on
adoring her regardless?
By now everybody I know in the street’s
been to see us, Imelda Singh in fact popping in regularly after school, and
even grumpy Mr Machin making it one afternoon, having left Barry in charge of
the shop, with a box of Cadbury’s Roses chocs done up very nicely in blue paper
with cherubs on it, and a small plastic rattle for Baby Bunting done up in ditto.
That Aunty Kate won’t let him have, she’s positive bits will come off it and
choke him. Not that he’s up to holding a rattle, yet.
We’ve now got a collection of these dangerous
and/or poisonous little doo-hickeys, so Katie had the inspiration of turning
them into a mobile for him. She had to fight off Imelda, having incautiously
mentioned the idea in front of her, but she managed that, and took the lot
away, returning after what was apparently several days’ blood, sweat, and near
tears, with a really lovely mobile. Mostly of blue wire coat hangers.
Everything on it is detachable, evidently the little blue wire hooks holding
them on caused the most blood, sweat, and tears. By that time she was back at
Euan’s, and Bridget explained that he bought her a decent pair of wire-cutters and
a strong pair of pliers for bending the stuff. I said that sounded all right
and she looked very dubious: she hates saying anything the slightest bit nasty
about anyone, dear Bridget. And eventually said she didn’t think they were
seeing very much of each other, really. Euan’s immersed in talks about this new
script he’s considering and Katie’s round at her place most nights to watch
telly with the girls. We-ell… I can understand she wouldn’t want to watch the
News by herself these days, but why isn’t he watching it with her like any
normal boyfriend? Not to say, any normal human being!
Everybody in the flats that I know has come
to see us, too; that is, almost everybody from the building except the
mysterious resident next to Mr Els, on the floor below us but at the front. Mr
Els reported that he or she was in again last week, but as usual very late at
night, he only heard him/her moving around and flushing, didn’t catch a
glimpse. He brought me a lovely bunch of flowers, even though I hardly know him,
really, and there was one awful incident when he and his new little
scraggy-haired Jay-Jay tried to get in the lift when me and Tim were in it and Tim
looked at Jay-Jay and Jay-Jay had hysterics and rushed over to the large
Chinese vase that’s a feature of Mr Els’s floor and did a puddle by it. Which
was rather unfortunate because it isn’t Mr Els’s vase, it belongs to the flat
on his other side, underneath Miss Hammersley’s, and both Mrs Merrihew and Miss
Waite (it’s not like that, they’re sisters), are very particular. Added to
which, Mrs Merrihew’s in the antique business and thought she might have found
a buyer for it. Everything in their flat’s for sale, stuff keeps going in and
out like anything, just when you’re thinking it’s looking perfect out something
goes, it’s a source of constant fascination to both Mr Els and Mrs Kennedy,
who’s underneath us, when she’s not taking tropical cruises on floating
casinos.
Anyway, like I say, almost everybody’s come
to see us, bringing flowers or little gifts. At one point John said feebly was
there anybody in the building I hadn’t spoken to? No, except the mysterious
neighbour of Mr Els and the new lady that’s bought old Mr Somerville’s flat on
the third floor. He didn’t die, his son and daughter-in-law made him move into
a Home, even though he was managing quite well and had meals on wheels and a very
nice visiting nurse, her name’s Judy, she’s popped in to see me and Baby
Bunting a couple of times, sort of mixed personal and professional interest.
John said feebly he saw. And how did I meet them all? Heck, I been here three
years now, how’d he think I met them all? In the lift, mostly, or once or twice
on the stairs, Garry Spedding and Roman Rutledge from the second floor always
take the stairs, part of their keep-fit plan. And I spoke to them? No, I just
panted on past them ignoring them or, if in the lift, stared blankly at a spot
ten inches to the left of their heads, John! Of course I spoke to them! –What
was he looking at me like that for? Did he dare ask—he’d dare anything, folks,
you might have realised by now this was the Royal Naval version of irony—did he
dare ask whether this was personal or sociological interest, Rosie?
“Personal, ya nong, ya can’t introduce the
topics of the Falklands War or the loss of the Empah in two seconds flat in a
lift!”
Even I couldn’t? That did surprise him. So
I bashed him with a pillow and the topic lapsed.
And
today we’re ready for our first outing! It’s a Saturday, I could’ve gone
yesterday or the day before, really, Aunty Kate having given me the nod and the
doc having given me the nod and even Doris, who’s the most conservative of
them, having given me the nod, but I wanted to wait for John.
“Just take the pram down the road?” he
echoes weakly.
“Yeah, ’course; well, down to Mr Machin’s,
and then we can get on round to see Raewyn and Sally and the Wus.”
“If that’s what you want, darling. I’d thought,
um, a taxi to the park and then a little stroll?”
There’s no park round here, what’s he on
about? It’s all elderly brick apartment buildings like ours or semidetached
brown brick houses with small front gardens stuffed with roses, like up the street
a bit. “What park? We haven’t got a park!”
“Er—never mind. But if you’re going to the
shops, don’t you want to pop in on Mr Goldman, as well?” –Mr Goldman runs a
kosher grocery. My great brain did eventually manage to work out, what with the
ad in the window for matzos and the big barrel of dill pickles and the name and
the little skull cap he always wears that Mr Goldman’s Jewish, but given that
it was John who actually first mentioned the word “kosher”—!
“It’s Saturday, you nong, he’ll be closed.”
“Oh, of course. Very well, down Raewyn and
Sally’s street let it be.”
So we set off. Aunty Kate won’t come with
us (she’s being considerate), but she doesn’t trust me to carry Baby Bunting
safety down in the wanking lift with its awful open grille-work. She carries
him herself while John manoeuvres the pram in.
As we
reach the ground floor old Mr O’Connor appears. Oops. Is he gonna point out
that, though there’s no legal impediment, it’s not a condo, the residents’
committee has agreed that flats shouldn’t be let to people with kids?
No he
isn’t, actually, he’s gonna coo over Baby Bunting in a hoarse whisper and make
us promise to come to tea with him and Geraldine tomorrow. With the baby, of
course! If John’s free? He means afternoon tea, of course, and at this juncture
any normal grandparents would be absolutely sure to have insisted we go to them
for our first afternoon tea out with Baby, but guess what! So we accept
gratefully.
“How well do you know the O’Connors?” John
asks cautiously as, Aunty Kate having superintended his manoeuvring of the pram
down the front steps (maybe deciding to buy the lease of Joanie’s flat was a mistake
after all), we at last set off alone together. He’s pushing the pram and he’s
tucked my hand into his elbow, I guess that’s how it’s done? I don’t reveal my
ignorance by remarking on it.
“Um, well, just to talk to, really.” I
explain about Wednesday always being their day for the pictures, they always
have a limo, and he remembers that I told him that, long-distance to
Washington, when I was incarcerated in the flat by Brian at the time The
Observer and Parkinson were breaking the great LILY ROSE REVEALED AS
INTELLECTUAL UNIVERSITY LECTURER story.
“I never knew her name was Geraldine,” I add.
“It’s quite a pretty name, isn’t it?”
“Mm. Do the O’Connors have children,
darling?”
“Yes, three. George is an engineer, he’s
out in Dubai working on a salination plant.”
“Desalination, I think, Rosie,” he murmurs.
“Eh? Oh. Yeah, it would be. He’s divorced,
the kids are at secondary school now and his ex, she lives in Hamburg.
Originally she was having a thing with a German guy but she dumped him, only by
then she’d landed a really good job so she stayed on. Kathleen, she’s on her
second marriage, she lives in Canada, she’s got three teenage girls from the
first marriage. They send over lots of pics. It looks awfully cold, they’re
usually muffled up in huge puffy windcheaters. And Rob’s an accountant, he’s
the youngest. He lives quite near, only they don't get on with the wife, she’s
flashy. Don’t ask me what that means,” I warn. “Not wanting children and
wearing lots of jewellery, was all I could gather. Though mind you, that’d do
it for most in-laws.”
“Mm. Cheap jewellery?”
“No, I thought that, too. No, real gold
stuff that she makes him buy.”
“Flashy and expensive?” he says with
a laugh. “The woman sounds like a disaster!”
“That’s
what Mr and Mrs O’Connor think, yeah. Of course, she doesn’t cook, but then
young woman don’t, these days. –Mrs O’Connor wasn’t getting at me, she was just
rather sad about it. She's one of those vague, amiable, rather untidy old
ladies, y’know? In her case, very well-dressed with it, he’s got megabucks. He
was in banking. I think they’re so resentful over Rob’s wife because they never
get to see the grandkids that are in Canada and in the school holidays they
hardly ever get to see George’s kids because the ex usually has them with her
in Germany.”
“I see. So the younger O’Connors would be
what? In their forties? Thirties?”
“George is forty-four, she was twenty-six when she had him, she’s quite
a bit younger than Mr. I think Kathleen’d be forty. And Rob’s thirty-two: he
was a late baby.”
“Mm.” He’s smiling like anything.
“What’s the joke?”
“Well, Rosie, you just described the senior
O’Connors as people you only know to talk to.”
“They are: I said, I didn’t even know her
name was Geraldine.”
He laughs so much he has to stop, hanging
on tightly to Baby Bunting’s pram handle with one hand, and blow his nose and
mop his eyes.
“Naval nong. What do you imagine we talk about?”
“Their entire life histories, apparently.”
“Pooh.” I take his arm again and we stroll
on in a state of perfect marital bliss. Baby Bunting’s asleep, we can only see
the very top of his woolly hat, it’s a real pram with the baby facing you,
thank God. I think those ones where it has to face the other way must be terrifying;
imagine being pushed through an unknown universe by an unseen force and having
all these strange shapes swimming up at you instead of the comfortingly familiar
blur that's Mum or Dad. Probably designed by an engineer, talking of salination
and desalination, with his head full of theory and cleverness.
“That was odd,” he says as we pass The
Tabla and its side door remains closed.
“Eh?”
“No Imelda.”
“No, it’s Saturday: Mrs Singh’s forcing her
to go to netball, she thinks she's not getting enough exercise. She’s rotten at
it, of course, and they’ve put her in the bottom team with all the duffers, and
at that she’s only a reserve, all she does is stand on the sidelines muffled up
in layers of woollies eating oranges.”
“Mrs
Singh would’ve done better to let her go to dance lessons at Della’s.”
“Yeah, only Mr Singh hasn’t weakened to
that extent, especially as the mere idea of it makes her so vague and
star-struck the homework doesn’t get done.”
“Has he thought that if she goes, and
discovers she has no talent, she'll give up the whole— What?”
“Only the truly logical-minded could
possibly conclude that, John!” I say with a laugh, hugging his arm.
“And we of the Royal Navy, I presume?” he
replies drily. “Go on, expose the fallacy.”
“There are people at Della’s older than I
am—well, Arthur’s a case in point, not to say Vanessa—who’ve been taking
lessons for years and still haven’t realised that!”
“Er—mm. But Arthur’s not labouring under
the delusion that he’ll actually make it on the stage, is he?”
“No, only under the delusion that one day
he’ll actually dance and Della will be mad enough to let him take a moving part
in one of her shows. But Vanessa’s going religiously to auditions for chorus
parts and backing dances in telly commercials or awful song videos, and like
that.”
“Not really? What about the hairdressing?”
“John, that’s her job. Dancing isn’t
a job, it’s a vocation.”
“I think you mean a fixation. But I would
have said Imelda was bright enough for it to dawn, especially if Della’s as
brutally frank as you claim she is.”
“Yes. But will she admit it to herself
before, well, realistically, her nineteenth birthday?”
He winces. “You’ve got a point there,
darling!”
“Yeah. So don’t put your logical theory to
Mr Singh, will ya? He’s a male, too.”
“I see. It’s not confined to the Royal
Navy, then?”
“Nope. Just Y-chromosome linked.”
He shakes slightly, and we stroll on to Mr
Machin’s shop in a state of perfect marital bliss.
Barry shoots out from behind the counter
immediately. “Ooh, you’ve brought him! Is this his first walk? Ace! Look, Dad,
Rosie and the Captain have brought Baby Bunting!”
Brightening, though them as didn’t know him
very well wouldn’t recognise he was, Mr Machin also comes out from behind the
counter. He contemplates Baby Bunting, at least the very top of his hat with
the white pom-pom on it, in silence for a bit. “Pity they have to grow up,” he
pronounces heavily at last.
“Give over, Dad!”
“Barry was a really pretty baby,” he tells
us gloomily. “Never think it to look at him now, would you?
“No, but at his age, no-one wants to look
like a pretty baby, Mr Machin!” I remind him.
He sighs, and goes back behind his counter.
“You’ll need more milk, I suppose? That aunty of yours seems to get through it
like nobody’s business. And the tea. You wanna watch her, Captain, she was in
here asking me if I sold English Breakfast only yesterday.”
Gulp, was she?
“We probably do need more milk, yes,”
John’s telling him amiably, “and if Kate was asking about tea it sounds as if
we need some more of that, but we didn't really come in for that.”
“No, we came to show you Baby Bunting! Um,
I don’t wanna put the shopping on top of him, I think that’s awful,” I say
uneasily.
Barry investigates the pram busily. Heck,
we haven’t got a carry-bag attached to it! He thought all the modern prams had
those!
“Shut up. And stop yelling like that,
you’ll wake him up,” Mr Machin tells him in a sort of lowered ordering
voice, very odd. “It’s a very nice pram. I wanted one just like that for him,”
he tells us, pointedly turning his shoulder on him. “But his mother wanted one
of those new-fangled ones that convert into a pushchair.” He sniffs. “Rickety.”
“This one’s nice and strong, though,” Barry
reports, uncrushed. Well, he has had nineteen years to get used to it.
Ignoring him, his father decides he’ll make
up our grocery order for us, and Barry can bring it over for us. I stagger slightly
and clutch at John’s arm: the Machins never deliver! –No, it’s no trouble at
all! So he forces us to decide what groceries we want, and puts it all into a
big carton. It’ll be the wrong sort of bacon, you betcha boots, it won’t be
anything like the Aussie bacon at Aunty Kate’s favourite Adelaide supermarket.
And ten to one, even though the eggs are totally different here—hen’s eggs,
battery raised, same as home, it’s the grading system that’s different,
whaddareya?—as I say, it’s Lombard Street to a China orange they’ll be wrong,
too. And John pays for it all, and the slate, not remarking on the amount it’s
shot up to, and for a nice ice-lolly for me that Barry produces, unasked, and
we go.
At the last minute Barry rushes out with a
video, they just got a new lot in, do I want it? John’s eyeing it askance: Rupy
has now warned him about Mr Machin’s trade in home-made pirate videos, offshore
pirate videos, Hong Kong pirate videos, and frankly porno videos. Of course I
want it: thanks, Barry! He nods madly, promises to add it to our shopping, and
dashes back in.
“Video of what?” croaks my poor hubby as we
stroll on.
I swallow choc-coated ice cream. “Dunno.
One of the new releases. It’ll be a Hong Kong or Thai copy, probably. With a
bit of luck it’ll have the original sound track on it without huge Chinese
sub-titles all the way up the side of the screen, madly distracting. They had a
great version of Gladiator, you won’t of heard of it, it was an Aussie
actor that played the lead, you won’t of heard of him, it’s a Roman Empire
epic, kind of post-Cecil B. de Mille: what few words there were, as opposed to
grunting and yelling, were dubbed into Chinese, plus and the sub-titles for
them as spoke a different version of Chinese. We managed to sit through it, but
only just. It was real blurred, too: think it was filmed in an LA movie house.”
I return to the delicious ice cream, mm,
the sort with a kind of toffee bit inside, and he shakes his head as of one
with water in the ear, so I say: “Sorry. Information overload. Just tell me to
shut up.”
“I don’t want you to shut up, darling, I’ve
just spent months at sea away from you. But—uh— Why did you want to watch it?
Oh, was it some actor Rupy’s got a crush on?”
I choke on the ice cream. “No! Too macho
for him, his name’s not— Never mind, you never heard of her,” I recognise. “No,
we wanted to watch it because it was a new release. Geddit?”
“No!” he says with a laugh, and we head for
the corner in a state of perfect marital bliss…
His first walk! Raewyn and Sally are
ecstatic. John doesn’t know them very well, though they were at the wedding,
and he has taken dry-cleaning to them several times. And so, when they finally
let us go he asks cautiously: “Darling, they are gay, are they?”
“Yeah, ’course; ya didn't think it was
confined to the skinny butches of under thirty with the nose rings, didja?”
Pretty obviously he did. Raewyn and Sally aren’t
like that. Well, Sally’s fairly butch in appearance, but she was cooing over
Baby Bunting as much as anyone, and it was her that turned that giant fuzzy
grey jumper of mine with the green splodge on the arm into a very smart black
après-ski or even cocktail jumper, with a row of silver stars round the neck.
They’re both in their early forties. Raewyn just looks like someone’s plumpish,
rather tired mum, with blonded hair going dark at the roots except where it’s
going grey. She usually wears tracksuit pants and a tee-shirt under a flowered
overall. Sally’s rather thin, and wears her short ginger hair in a butch cut,
and usually a fawn overall over a tee-shirt and tracksuit pants.
“No…” he says slowly. “I got the impression
that Raewyn has children, was I wrong?”
“Nope. Gavin and Imogen. Different fathers.
They both dumped her. So she went off men entirely; dunno that I blame her,
with two hungry mouths to feed. Gavin was fourteen when Imogen’s father walked
out on them and Imogen was two, if ya want the gory details. Two can be a very
stroppy age; you ever heard of the expression ‘the terrible twos’?”—He shakes
his head bemusedly.—“Well, be warned. And at fourteen they can be very
difficult as well as eating enormous amounts. It took her ages and ages to find
a job and she was bloody lucky that the job she did find was with Sally. Her
partner had just dumped her for a much younger and more attractive girl. What I
mean, she was a partner in the business as well as a life-partner, so-called.”
“I
see.”
Don’t think he does, but then, probably no
hetero man could. “Raewyn’s much happier with Sally than she ever was with
either of the blokes, John,” I say kindly.
“Oh, I see. So she was a Lesbian all
along?”
See? Wants to make it all logical, not to
say ship-shape and Bristol fashion. “Think of it that way if it makes you
happy.”
“Honestly, Rosie! Er… so she’s settled for
second-best?”
“No!” I say with a laugh. “Sexually it
might be second-best, though from the look of her I wouldn’t say so. But emotionally
it certainly isn’t.”
He supposes he sees what I mean. Yeah. I
hug his arm a bit and we stroll on…
“You’ve brought Baby Bunting!” Mr Wu’s out of the takeaway shop and
cooing over the pram before we can even suggest bringing him over the threshold.
“Isn’t he lovely?” –He hasn’t got a Chinese accent, he’s fourth-generation
British.
We agree, smiling like the doting parents
we are, that the pom-pom on the top of Baby Bunting’s head is lovely and do
accept Mr Wu’s suggestion that we get him out of the cold, and in we go. Mrs
Wu’s there, she comes out from behind the counter, beaming, and says Louise will
be so sorry to have missed him. Look at him, sleeping like an angel! And she
hopes we didn’t spend too long in the dry-cleaners’, of course Raewyn and Sally
are so used to it they never notice it, but the fumes can’t be good for a baby.
And is he sleeping at night, and how are we managing? Mr Wu seems as interested
as she is, so we tell them.
“Fumes?” John says feebly as we turn our
steps towards home, that’s probably enough excitement for my first walk after
the baby and for Baby Bunting’s very first trip in his pram.
At this I break down and laugh helplessly,
so much so that he has to stop the pram and, still hanging on tight to the handle
with one hand, produce his hanky for me.
“Thanks!” I gasp. “So used to it they never
notice it! And it is only spices and frying oil.”
“And cabbage,” he notes.
Funnily enough that sets me off again. But
at last I’m fit to proceed and we stroll home…
Oops: no, we don’t. Tiffany Singh shoots
out, quite à la Imelda, and catches us up three paces past The Tabla.
“Are you out for your first walk?” she gasps.
“Yeah. Hi, Tiffany. How’s uni?”
She not listening, she’s bending avidly
over the pram. “Isn’t he a little angel?”
Well, mounds of wet and soiled nappies
apart, yeah. Has it occurred to the scientists who magicked up those wonderful
disposable ones that in a couple of thousand years the Earth will have
completely disappeared under one huge mountain of disposable nappies? Not that
it’ll matter, because by then the global warming will have caught up with us
and there’ll be no breathable atmosphere left at all.
John’s nudging me. “Eh? Oh! Yep, no argument
there, Tiffany.”
She supposes wistfully she couldn’t come
home with us and see him put to bed, could she?
Why not, it might keep me from attacking
Aunty Kate about drinking up all John’s English Breakfast tea that me and Rupy
have been carefully refraining from drinking, since we realised we’d finished
up the last lot and bought some more for him and the Lipton for us.
So we stroll home in a state of marital
bliss as to us, and by the look of Tiffany, a state of very soon about to
fulfil all Mrs Singh’s hopes and settle down with a nice boy to produce
grandkids for her. Oops. Well, it if wasn’t us and our Baby Bunting it'd have
been someone else, if that’s what her hormones are prompting her to.
After Baby Bunting’s been admired and, sigh,
changed yet again, and put back into his bassinet she comes into the kitchen
with me and since Aunty Kate’s gone to the loo and John’s on the phone in the
other room, seizes the opportunity to tell me, with shining eyes, that John’s
so nice!
“Um, yeah. Thought you knew that, Tiffany?”
–Grin, grin.
“Yes!” –Very flustered, looks about
Imelda’s age. “Not that! I mean, he’s so proud of the baby!”
“Yes. Did you think it might be only the
Indian men that go all soppy over babies?” –Her eldest brother, Richpal, has to
be seen to be believed when anyone brings a baby near him, not to mention being
totally dotty over his own little Billy, he’s about eighteen months now. And
you might think no doting father could be dottier, only you should have seen him
when Billy was really little! Not to mention Mr Singh. Well, admittedly
the grandpa hormones were going mad, in his case, it being his first.
“Um, I suppose I did!” she gasps, laughing
a bit.
“Apparently not!” I acknowledge. “Uncle
Jim’s just the same,” I explain.
Her jaw drops. “Why didn’t she bring
him?” she hisses.
I only have time to screw up my face and
shrug before Aunty Kate bustles in and we both shut up like clams.
“Well,” I conclude as the front door
finally closes after the glowing Tiffany, “I’d say that Mrs Singh’s
grandchildren worries are over. I’ve never seen a girl go soppier over a sprog.”
“Really, Rosie!” she squawks.
“Aunty Kate, she was emanating maternal
glow, for cripes’ sake!”
“I agree entirely, Kate!” he says with a
laugh, bless him.
“Gee, could ya see it past yours, John?”
At that Aunty Kate gets up and packs me
firmly off to bed, I’ve overdone it.
“Look, I didn’t say—”
No arguments are brooked and I go.
He comes in cautiously about ten minutes
later, checks Baby Bunting and comes over to me. “He’s fast asleep. All right,
darling?” he breathes.
I don’t think Baby Bunting’s gonna wake up,
nevertheless I say in a lowered voice: “Yeah. Siddown.”—He sits on the edge of
the bed.—“I didn’t say I disapproved of your maternal glow.”
“I know. –Paternal,” he corrects me mildly.
“Can you have a paternal glow?”
“Only
if your mind is free of the usual clichés, darling. Not to say, objective enough
to be able to examine the facts.”
“You’re right. Paternal glow it is. –Thank
God.”
“Could you doubt it, Rosie?” he says cautiously.
“Yeah, I’d never seen you with really
little kids before. Well, I know you were awfully good with Imelda that first
time she inflicted herself on us at the cottage, but let’s face it, you’re
awfully good with all red-blooded females. And actually Sally gave a pretty
good imitation of eating out of your hand, this arvo.”
“She was pleased to see my paternal glow, I
think, darling. Probably one of the majority who assume the male half can’t.”
“Eh? Oh, can’t glow! You’re right, come to
think of it. I’ve never seen her look at a bloke with such approval.”
“Mm,” he says, yawning widely.
“Have a lie-down, too.”
He looks automatically at his watch but
does slip his shoes off and lie down…
“Ssh!” I hiss as the door opens slowly.
“Is he asleep?” she mouths, not meaning
Baby Bunting.
“Yes!” I hiss.
An
approving nod is seen in the faint glow from the passage and the door closes
silently. Cor. Didn’t say it was time for tea, or he’ll never sleep tonight if
he naps now, or— Cor.
Next morning she tells me, as he’s walking
Tim, rather late, that it’s not just the terrorist crisis, it’s a strain for them,
especially the very active men who are used to being in command of their lives,
not being able to do anything but stand on the sidelines and watch, but I had
worked out that out, actually, Aunty Sigmund. I don’t say it, I don’t want to
be cut off in my prime before Baby Bunting’s learned to smile. (It’s only wind,
unquote, at the moment.)
“So,” she says firmly, setting out a great
plate of toast, he hates cold, leathery toast, oh, dear: “you can stop
worrying, Rosie.”
“Eh?
I wasn’t worry—”
“Yes,
you were, dear,” she says, removing a great tray of bacon from under the grill.
Blast! He doesn’t need all that salt and cholesterol, especially since we had
hefty steak and kidney pie last night. Added to which he doesn’t like lukewarm
bacon. Added to added to which, Tim does, he makes a real pest of
himself if we have bacon.
“Well, at his age, objectively speaking,”—Ouch!
Who does she sound like?—“it’s quite on the cards that a man might not be too
keen on starting a second family.”
I watch numbly as she breaks despised
wrong-size English eggs into a bowl and starts whipping them up. “Um, yeah. Um,
but he was very keen when he found out I was preggy.”
“Mm. But the proof of the pudding’s in the
eating, isn’t it?” She pours milk into the eggs. That’ll make them break up, he
hates separated-out scrambled eggs with the eggy bits all hard and dry and the
milk running all over the plate.
“Um, yeah, what? Yeah. Um, aren’t you
putting too much milk into those scrambled eggs, Aunty Kate?”
Tolerant smile. Not making scrambled eggs.
Right, well, I give up, because anything she calls an omelette won’t fall
within the Haworth definition, you bet. Omelettes are only eaten at one,
possibly two nice restaurants in England, darling, and he’ll take me to a
lovely little place just outside of Boulogne (? Froggy place-name, coulda been
that) where they whip up superb ones. Food of the gods!
Now what? She’s pouring the mixture into a
different bowl, bigger. “What are you making?” I bleat, giving in completely.
Pancakes.
Oh, God. He had pancakes in the States
during his six months’ stint there until they were coming out his ears, he’s
said he doesn’t care if he never eats another pancake as long as he lives. Not
including crapes (?) in the category, darling!
“Um, is that a pancake mix?”
“Yes, of course. Aunt Jemima. Why?”
A man that eats my fish fingers
uncomplainingly will eat anything, this is true. Oh, well. She’s telling me I
could make them but I’m not listening. Not and get them out of the frying-pan,
I couldn’t. Not to mention get them into it, aren’t pancakes supposed to be
round?
She’s making a start on the training: I
have to go and watch. I watch… Nope, couldn’t do that. Nope, couldn’t do that.
Yikes, couldn’t do that without dropping it on the stove, myself, the floor!
Couldn’t do any of it. How does she know they’re not burnt underneath?
“What was that you said,” I say as she shares
out the pancakes between the dinner plates, it’s a posh set that one of his
upper-clawss friends gave us for a wedding present, Royal Something on the
backs of the plates, John thinks we ought to keep them for special occasions,
pity it was only me he said it to, “about the proof of the pudding?”
“Pudding?”
“About John.”
“What? Oh! You can stop worrying that he
might not adore Baby, because it’s obvious that he does. I thought you realised
that was what I meant, Rosie?”
“Just checking. Um—don’t give him all that
bacon, talking of his age.”
“That’s yours,” she says.
“Oh,
is it? Oh, good!”
“Take it through to the table, dear, don’t
let it get cold.”
“Maybe we ought to wait until he gets
back.”
“Rubbish, I dare say some neighbour’s waylaid him it the street to ask
after you and Baby. I’ll put his in the oven.”
She puts his in the oven, turned very low.
Oh, dear. What a reward for a proud father. Warmed-over packet pancakes and
warmed-over bacon that’s had time to congeal and go really, really hard before
it got put in the oven, to be followed by very, very, very cold toast.
When he comes in he sits down to it like a
lamb, only pausing to shut Tim in the bathroom since he can’t behave himself.
Luckily she’s arranged with Doris, who
isn’t religious either, to accompany Miss Hammersley to a really nice C. of E.
service this morning, so the two old dears turn up to collect her and she
vanishes with them. Peace reigns, and I forcibly stop him from eating a piece
of leathery toast and chuck the lot down the waste-disposal chute.
“You ate it all and loved it,” I say firmly.
“Don’t touch that bloody tea, it’s stewed to death. I’ll make you a fresh pot.
And some more toast.”
“No, really! I don’t need any toast, darling!”
“No, but do ya want some ?”
Er, yes, is the answer, guilty grin. So he
gets given some. And a nice fresh pot of— Bugger the woman! I knew it, not a
crumb of English Breakfast left! Of Lipton’s.
“Did I eat all those leftover pancakes?” he
says meekly, drinking Lipton’s without comment.
“Yeah. She made them without asking me if
it might be a good idea.”
“Of course.”
I look at him glumly. “I know I ought to be
ruddy grateful to her, and I am, but couldn’t we get rid of her, John?”
He shakes his head firmly. “Beyond human
capacity, sweetheart.”
“Yeah!” I say with a surprised snort of
laughter. Thought he was gonna say—well, something dutiful, y’know? “Shall we
nip in take a peek at him?”
“Yes,
let’s!”
We do that….
After a while the tears start to trickle
down my face and he leads me out again. “What is it, darling? Thinking about
Fred again?”
“No!—I’m—so—happy!” I bawl.
“Well, that’s good,” he says mildly, giving
me a big hug.
“She’s—right—bugger—her!” I bawl.
“Who? Kate?’
“Yes,” I admit, sniffing and gulping.
“Isn’t she always?’ he says, looking prim.
He knows his prim face always breaks me up,
and sure enough, I laugh like a drain, only somehow I start to bawl again in the
middle of it.
So he sits down on the awful grungy fawn
sofa that came with the flat and pulls me onto his knee and hugs me some more.
“What was all that about?” he says mildly when I’m sniffing and gulping again.
“Nothing. You got a hanky?” He always does
have, totally trained as he is. “Thanks. She said I could stop worrying that
you might not adore Baby Bunting. Words to that effect.”
“I see.”
I blow my nose hard and nod.
He leans his chin on my head and sighs. “Why
didn’t you say anything, cuckoo?”
Bloody hard to, when the party of the
second part’s at the other end of a phone line and all them radio waves with
half the ship’s crew listening in. I don’t say it, he’d be awfully hurt.
“Making mountains out of mole hills,” I mutter.
“Mm, you were!” he says, hugging me very
tight.
“Yeah.” And a peaceful silence falls…
“Poor
old Admiral Sir Father,” I muse.
“What?”
Shit, did I say that out loud? “Um, sorry!
I think of him like that to myself—sorry! I only meant that I think he could’ve
been rather the same type as you, if left to himself. And a totally doting grandpa,
if only she'd let him.”
“Mm. Well, I think he may manage that,
whether or not she lets him,” he says, with a certain wry emphasis on the
“she”, even though I carefully didn’t put any emphasis on it. “That was him on
the phone earlier. He’d like to come over for tea this afternoon.”
“But we’re going down to the O’Connors’, John!”
“I don’t think they’d mind if Father came
with us, Rosie.”
“No-o… Shit, ya mean she’s letting him come
by himself?”
“He isn’t as tightly tied to her apron-strings
as you seem to assume, darling. He is coming by himself, since Mother’s got a
bridge party with some of her cronies, yes.”
They don’t live in London, they live in the
country, and they’re staying at a nayce hotel. So I’m blank. “Um, ya mean she’s
got bridge cronies in London as well?” I fumble.
“Of course.”
“Cripes.”
He
hugs me. “So he’ll be able to have a nice dote, mm?”
“Yeah. Gosh, the grandpa hormones are
stronger than I thought,” I croak dazedly.
Funnily enough he seems to understands this
strange piece of the L.R. Marshall vernacular: he hugs me and laughs and says:
“I think they must be!”
After bit I admit slowly: “I hadn’t
realised…”
“I know!”
“Not
that, John… He really loves you, doesn’t he? Besides being terribly proud of
you.”
He swallows. “Well, yes. But Mother does
too, Rosie.”
“Yes, I’ve always realised that. But— It’s
harder to see it in a man, you’re socialised into putting up a much better
screen to your emotions.”
“Certainly Father’s generation, yes.”
And the rest, with your wanking
British public schools, mate! (Don’t say it.) “Yeah… It’s all very sad,
really.”
“Now,
don't get mournful again, darling! It’s not sad at all, Father thinks Baby
Bunting’s marvellous and he can’t wait to come over and get another glimpse of
him!”
I didn’t mean that, ya naval nong, I meant
the whole bit, poor old socialised-out-of-his-emotions Admiral Sir Father, and
being married to that cold bitch, who, by the way, I bet’s as cold in bed as she
is in company, and not being allowed to have Matt come and stay all those years
he was growing up, and never developing into the sort of man John is, but
staying firmly under her thumb…
He makes me blow my nose again.
“I’m glad you’re you,” I say idiotically.
“I’m glad I’m me, too! Shall we have
another peek at him?” he says eagerly.
We do that, the pair of besotted new parents
that we are…
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