Average Sunday Afternoon Read online

  Eventually Irene told me the full story – she had to, it was her raison d’être. “He was the vicar, and we moved into his parish, my husband and I, and well, nothing like it had ever happened to me – to us – in our lives – like this before, and he and I fell deeply in love. Yes, I caused the break-up of his marriage, and of course my own too.” She held up the tea-towel. Marriage break-up sounded like getting rid of old scrap iron, doing the world a favour. Spare spouses cast aside to . . .to what? No-one ever discusses this.

  “So we had to leave the district, with the scandal and all – his wife did kick up a stink, most unpleasant, you know.” I knew that the teachings of Christ, while quite radical on the topic of love, did not stretch as far as having to give up your partner immediately anyone else took a fancy to them. Her own ex-husband had obviously made less trouble. The ex-wife, now no longer a vicar’s wife, broken-hearted, with a lost husband, lost vicarage, church and congregation; had she had to move away too? These two sacrificial victims (and any unmentioned children) had all been offered up on the altar of this new love. I marvelled. She put the yellow gloves aside on the draining board and took off the apron.

  I could see it would take a lot of washing-up to make up for the loss of a pretty church, house and garden in a county town. Now Jim was some type of school attendance officer, too old to train in computers or as a proper social worker or any pukka job. Her guilt would oil his existence forever. A lot of washing-up liquid, scouring creams, powders, cloths, sponges. He had earned the right to leave bodily throwaways all around and never wash a cup either. Darling, forever darling.

  After they went, I eyed the abandoned church across the fields, now totally inaccessible, surrounded by wafting corn, marooned above a golden harvest. It had been their view as they woke, a combination of mirage and reproach. At midday the sunlight dashed through its windows from side to side, making it shimmer as if it were floating on a sea of gold.

  Fallen Image

  They could not have reached Wales without Uncle Jack's taxi. This year Nana had organized the holiday via an advert in The Echo and everyone else in the family was left behind, which was extremely strange, as summer holidays were always a family gathering, sometimes running to the renting of two bungalows, with extra uncles, aunts and cousins arriving on daytrips. This holiday was different, just Nana, Aunty Kay, her daughter Ann and cousin Marge, all piled into Uncle Jack's gleaming black taxi.

  There was no seaside, this was far inland, past Flint. The roads grew steadily more and more wild, dry mud-tracks with clouds of dust rising on either side. They were almost lost, but Nana had the owner's letter, the shop where the key had been left for them marked on a map, shakily drawn in blue ink. Here and there, bricks had been thrown into holes in the road, to be crunched by passing wheels. Rain would have helped.

  "Oh yes," said the shopkeeper in the little stores on the only road that led in that direction. "Here's the key. You're the people for Cerrig-y-Ty, Mrs Davies's, that is. You can get everything here, save yourself the bother of having to come back . I'm open until six, but you can always knock on the back door if you need anything extra. There's always one of us in.”

  Nana bought some tea, as it would always come in useful, and tins of evap and a bottle of milk. "The road's down there, and Cerrig-y-Ty is about a mile along. You can't miss it."

  They nearly did. Cerrig-y-Ty was on a hillside, with the cottage set far up on the hill, so that the taxi had to nestle in a dusty patch by the hedge while they traipsed up a flight of steps and then paving stones with smooth rocks set into the soil. The front door was unlocked.

  “You can see why,” said Nana, “The place is too deserted for anyone to think of coming here at all.” There was a stone-flagged living room-cum-kitchen, with a bare larder and three bedrooms with lumpy beds of different sizes. “We’re lucky it’s not damp.”

  “Damp!” said Aunty Kay. “Haven’t you noticed? There’s no water at all – there’s a note by the cooker here that says the water-pump is a mile away, the opposite way from the shop. Look! Here’s the jugs!” Two large white enamel jugs, like squat swans, stood by the fireplace. Uncle Jack was sent off with Ann and the jugs in the taxi to see where the pump was. As it was August, Ann came back with some ripe blackberries.

  So few cars went in that direction that the berries were quite free from road-dust. Jack lugged the water-jugs into the kitchen where Kay had managed to connect the Calor gas canister to the stove, so Nana made a cup of tea and cheese on toast for all, while Kay made up the beds with the sheets brought from home.

  “The girls can have a play before bedtime. It’s early yet.”

  “Where’s the toilet?” asked Ann, of the weak bladder.

  “I imagine it’s that shed by the back door,” her mother answered. They went out to see. But there was only an old bike and some garden implements, all rusty and covered with thick spiders’ webs. There was another shed on its own, in the middle of an overgrown patch of rambler roses., but it contained coal and logs of wood, plus some rusting corrugated iron sheets.

  “There’s got to be something, “Nana said, looking sharply around the garden. Then they noticed even more stone steps set into the hillside, continuing upwards behind the cottage. Overgrown with marigolds and nasturtiums, more blackberries, nettles and a glorious mix of roses gone mad, the steps led up to another outhouse. Kay opened the door with a tug and there in the gloom was a toilet. The floor was of marble (“No, that’s just slate,” said Nana, laughing,) and there was a magnificent toilet seat of polished mahogany. The seat had two holes and was a wide as an average sideboard.

  “You could sit and hold hands, I suppose, “ Nana said, eying the newspaper pad hanging on a string. “This is yellow – it’s been here since before Christmas – see, the date – last October! Good God! Anyway, at least we know where it is. And don’t worry about the night-time, girls,” she added, as they tried not to stumble down the steps. “There’s potties under the beds, I’ve looked. None of us is coming up here in the night, even with a torch.”

  Outside, it was still light, a slow August sunset. Uncle Jack was going back to Liverpool directly. He led some everywhere-nowhere existence as a part-time taxi driver. He shared the taxi with someone they had never seen or known, and so the hours he worked changed perpetually. Nana and Kay were convinced that he did not work at all, as the money came in dribs and drabs.

  “I think he gambles a bit,” Marge’s mother told her one day. “He has no money for ages and then he gets a lot. That’s why Kay has to go out to work because when the in-between times come, there’s not enough for them to live on.” It was worse than that. In order to see her husband at all, Kay had ended up with a job at The Bell pub downtown.

  By eight o’clock that evening, Uncle Jack had left for Liverpool to carry on with his unemployment, as Kay put it. He would not have enjoyed himself in the country, she said. The cottage had been booked for a month, almost until school re-started in September.

  There were three paraffin lamps for the evening, which cast a golden glow across the room. From looking dirty and unkempt, it was now magical. For each day, however, the wicks would need trimming exactly, or wild spirals of black smoke would rise from their glass chimneys.

  The next morning was a bright Sunday.

  “Well, we’re definitely not going to Mass, wherever it is, “said Nana, frying eggs on a cooker that was even older than the one at home. “You can tell your mother, Marge, that there wasn’t a church to be seen, we are totally at the back of beyond. Going to get the shopping and the water will be bad enough.” They all went together to get the water, with pails and even the kettle, as well as the two jugs. “It’d be a good idea to get washed while we are there,” suggested Nana, who, like Aunty Kay , took all these setbacks as a sort of joke. “We could do our legs and feet, at least, at the pump, if we take a couple of towels draped round our necks.”

  They went off and had a public bath while there was no-one about. �
��And even if there was,” she said, “they wouldn’t know who you were, so there’s no need to worry.”

  They got back to find that the garden, which was the only flat bit of ground on the property, was full of cows. Five of them were wandering about, looking in at the windows and treading on the flowers. Although there were only five, it was like an invasion, as they were each so large and so fierce-looking close-up, and all in such a small space. The cows, backed into each other, could not find any way out into the fields. Nana , Kay and the girls tried to get in the front door, squeezing past the two nearest cows. They shut the door behind them with a gasp. A large face loomed in through the front window. A rear-quarters and tail flicked at the side-window.

  “There’s a gap in the hedge, I can see it, “ said Ann, peering out of one of the bedroom windows which overlooked the back garden and which was cow-free at present. “We can’t go out until they’ve gone,” she added wistfully. A chorus from Nana, Kay and Marge from the living room –

  “It’s all right, Ann, we’ve got the potties, don’t worry.”

  “Let’s have a cup of tea,” said Kay. “It is an adventure after all. You don’t get this sort of carry-on in Liverpool. This is what we come to the countryside FOR.”

  There was the loud sound of a cow splattering on the flowerbeds. They continued milling around and looking in the windows, making it dark inside.

  “They’re quite harmless, really,” said Nana. “They’re just big and stupid. Or perhaps lost. If they’re there much longer, then I’ll ask you to create a diversion and I’ll get down to the road, going round by the back and go and ask the man at the shop who they belong to.”

  “But it’s a mile walk,” said Kay.

  “Yes, I know, but I don’t like the idea of that lot tramping about all night. What if one of them rolls down the hillside? It could be terrible.”

  It was only a couple of minutes, though, before the cowman arrived through the same gap in the hedge.

  “Sorry about all this,” he said, amused to see what was going on. The family was crowded round the front door now, confident, because he had appeared with his dog. The dog yapped a bit and the cowman patted one of the mountainside shoulders, and the nearest cow, snorting grumpily to herself, trundled towards the gap and went through with dignity. The others gradually sorted themselves out, facing the right direction and followed, though the last one either panicked or did not want to go, and had to be prodded right round the cottage.

  There was a silence now, all the garden flowers trodden flat, with the odd cow-pat added here and there. The cowman had produced a large iron bedstead which formed an imitation gate in the hawthorn hedge. It had gradually slipped down, which was how the cows had managed to enter.

  “They get bored, they do. And once one has gone through, then the rest will follow. They are not dangerous, no, missus, they mean no harm.”

  “They may have lovely long eyelashes,” Nana said thoughtfully, “and those doleful eyes, but the back of them’s as big as a bus. Just leave all that cow-dung – the sun will dry it up and then there will be no flies by tomorrow afternoon, with any luck.”

  The next night there was a terrible clattering and a dull thud when they were all in bed. Aunty Kay lit a candle and edged into the living room. Nana appeared at the door of her bedroom with a torch, the bedspread flung round her shoulders. There was no-one there. The girls came out and searched round in the shadows.

  “It’s all right, Nana,” Marge called brightly, “it’s only a picture. It’s fallen down off the wall, see, there.” A large oil-painting, the portrait of a man in nineteenth-century clothes, as far as anyone could see, lay on the floor. It was so dirty and yellowed from years of coal fires and paraffin lamps that only the face and the white collar showed up dimly.

  “That’s it. We’re leaving as soon as Jack can pick us up. There’ll probably be a phone at that shop. I’ll even send a telegram if we must.” Nana leant against the bedroom doorway and then came and sat on the kitchen chair. “We’re going home.”

  “But why, Nana?” asked Marge.

  “Yes, why?” asked Ann. Kay was strangely silent.

  “Because it means a death, that’s what, when a picture falls down, so we’re not staying here another day.”

  Kay said “You shouldn’t be frightening them with all that superstition, you know, Mum. It can’t be true.”

  But there was a lightening of the atmosphere once they had decided to leave. The shopkeeper allowed them into his back parlour, where Kay rang her husband to collect them as soon as possible. They said nothing of the reason why. (For God’s sake don’t mention any illness, Nana warned, don’t pretend one of us is ill, or it might come true.) Uncle Jack arrived on Saturday afternoon, full of crafty remarks and witticisms. As long as he got them all back to Liverpool before the pubs got too far underway, his Saturday night was safe.

  As every year, it was strange to see buildings again, crowded so close together with no gardens or trees. Nana and the others drove off in Uncle Jack’s taxi as soon as a quick explanation was given to Marge’s mother. It had been strange to be careering round the backroads of Wales in a black taxi.

  “Probably illegal, God knows what’s happening to the meter,” Kay said under her breath.

  No mention of the picture, though. It had been one of those exceptional weeks that had seemed to have lasted six months. They had left two jars of jam on the cottage table (after all, they had use Mrs Davies’s old jamjars and blackberries,) with the key and a note of goodbye.

  Marge was back at school before she heard that Uncle Jack had been thrown out of the house shared with his wife, daughter and Nana. No-one explained why. He could be seen in town, wandering around, brilliantined black hair, coal-black eyes, on his mysterious route from pub to pub.

  “She threw him out” was all anyone in the family would say. “The minute they came back from Wales, he was out.”

  Miss Havisham Reconstructed

  A Miss Havisham who had, in fact, eaten up all the wedding cake and all the desserts and trifles, followed by bottle after bottle of champagne until it became boring. Later she had moved on to killing the mice and turning them into interesting little delicacies in aspic. Gradually, first the table and then the house became free of any food, though it took many years.

  She strode down the garden path, pushing aside the rusty gate and went out into the pass-a-day street, carrying a large square shopping bag of the sort no-one used any more. people scattered as she approached. Years of Nothing striding towards getting Something. A purse and a shopping list; the construction of a life. Bread, tea, milk, sugar, cheese – the eternals. A new pair of shoes. Some soap. The face on the coins she gave was of the young Queen; in change, pence and silver had a middle-aged woman’s profile on them. They had aged together.

  And when she got back the net curtains would get washed in the big cream sink. They produced black water, swirls of dirt and time. Lumps of wet net, heavy to lift, dumping them into the oval laundry-pail, she took them out to the garden where a weathered washing line hung between old apple trees. The servants had disappeared long ago. Some belongings, some wedding presents were missing, she knew that, but did not know precisely what, nor really cared what had gone.

  Clothes-pegs were unfindable in the dark scullery, so the lace curtains from the drawing room and dining room were hung directly over the thin rope of the decaying clothes-line. The day was fine, with hints of breeze. For the first time in years the curtains and herself were out in direct sunlight. A gust of wind flurried the delicate nets upwards, making them billow like veiling, white layer upon white layer. Miss Havisham stood transfixed with this miracle of shimmering whiteness.

  She was still encased in the faded wedding dress – it was threadbare and delicate in daylight. It might deteriorate rapidly out here in the fresh air, its fabric used only to an indoor life and most unsuitable for doing housework. A new dress of unfaded colour must be got somehow. A dressmaker coul
d come to the house and as well as constructing a dress could supply over a decade’s or more of gossip. But how was this to be achieved?

  In impeccable copperplate, Miss Havisham wrote a notice and tied it to her front gate with the string from one of the unused wedding presents.

  `Dressmaker wanted to sew new outfit. Must have references and supply own thread. Apply to Miss H. at this address`.

  This covered the basic questions. In no time at all the world marched back into Manor House with added zest. Master Pip had become something in the City and Miss Estella was now an interior designer.

  On Pip’s advice Miss Havisham aquired a good spread of investments, while Estella modernised the brewery building, transforming it into several up-market bijou residences. Miss Havisham is now on the board of several societies for the preservation of ancient buildings and can be seen on television regularly, giving talks on nineteenth century furniture and fashion.

  Off the Land

  A one-act play about Lady Gregory and her times.

  Scene One

  Inside a poor cottage near Gort. Mr and Mrs Glynn are sitting by a dying fire.

  Mrs Glyn : Have I told you that Lady Gregory’s coming round to tea? Herself, this very day.

  Mr Glynn: But we haven’t any tea.

  Mrs Glynn: Well, she’s coming round at the time we would be having tea if we had any cups and saucers, even.

  Mr Glynn: She will be already having tea up at the Big House, or it will be waiting for her when she gets back.

  Mrs Glynn: Oh, she’s probably having tea before she comes here and when she gets back, cakes and little biscuits and a big porter cake and plates of white bread and butter and scones.

  Mr Glynn: -and kippers –

  Mrs Glynn: and cheese on toast and cups and cups of tea with sugar. Sugar each time with silver teaspoons. Silver teaspoons rattling every afternoon on the saucers. And a white tablecloth, thick with starch.

  Mr Glynn: …Anyway, whatever are we going to do about the stuff you promised her?