Encounters

by Barbara Erskine

  ‘You haven’t decided.’ She repeated it just to make sure she’d heard aright.

  He grinned. ‘I know, Ginny. But if it was left to you we’d have fifty tatty old prints.’

  ‘Better that than one painting on acres of white wall. With white furniture. Malcolm, it’s going to look like an operating theatre!’

  ‘Rubbish. It’ll look very nice.’

  They shuffled forward another place in the queue.

  ‘It won’t. Oh come on. It’ll look terrible. It’ll have no warmth. It’ll be uncomfortable. Who’ll want to sit in a room like that, on a cold winter’s evening. No one.’

  ‘I will.’

  ‘Oh!’ Exasperated she stamped her foot. ‘Well, I won’t. You can bloody well sit there alone.’

  ‘Good. I will.’ He grinned at her. ‘Come on. We’re nearly there. Do you want a pink one or a white one?’

  ‘I don’t want one now. I want a cold drink.’ She pursed her mouth deliberately aping a small spoilt child. ‘Come on. I don’t want to stand in this silly queue.’

  ‘Well I do.’ The patient voice again. It snapped the last of Ginny’s control.

  ‘Well bloody well stand there then. I’m not going to!’

  She was conscious of the shocked faces turned to her and the people hastily moving out of her way. Then she was alone, in the quiet green no man’s land between the tents. She looked round for Malcolm following, but there was no sign of him. He had stayed stubbornly in the queue.

  She stood for a moment, her hands absent-mindedly strumming a taut guy rope, examining the woven skeins of hemp. Behind her she could hear the music and the excited shouts of children. In front there was a narrow strip of grass and then a high hawthorn hedge silent except for the occasional sleepy note of a hedge sparrow.

  As always her temper was gone as quickly as it had flared. She walked slowly back to the queue, her head held high. Malcolm had gone. She glanced round wildly, conscious of the interested glances of others waiting their turn for ice-cream, but there was no sign of him anywhere. In the ring a group of children were lining up for a race. ‘Are there any more boys, seven to eight years old?’ a megaphone boomed near her. ‘Your race is starting next. Boys seven and eight years old, please …’

  She began to walk slowly round the ring, her eyes scanning the crowds searching for Malcolm’s blue shirt. Suddenly every other man there seemed to be wearing a blue shirt, but each time she looked again, heart thumping a little, for his face, she found another.

  ‘Oh Malcolm, you beast. Where are you?’ She felt suddenly angry. He had no business to walk out on her like that. None at all. She stamped her foot.

  ‘Roll up, roll up. Come and try the hoopla. Roll up! Three hoops for fifty pence.’ She was standing right in front of a stall. Behind it the vicar himself, his round face flushed and perspiring a little peered at her anxiously, his dog collar restricting, over shirtsleeves. ‘Only fifty pence a go,’ he said again, almost pleading. He was looking straight at her. Glancing round, embarrassed, she realized that there was no one else near the stall.

  She grinned suddenly. ‘What the hell,’ she murmured and then clapped her hand, embarrassed, over her lips. She groped in her bag for the coin.

  The vicar watched eagerly as she stood poised, the hoop ready to flick from her wrist. It skittered across the table and rolled drunkenly and uselessly away. ‘Oh bad luck, my dear.’ He sounded really quite upset for her. She aimed better the next time. The hoop fell neatly around a small packet of sugar cigarettes. She shrugged helplessly as the vicar handed them to her and slipped them, trying to keep her face straight, into her bag. The third hoop teetered, wavering towards the edge of the table and fell, half encircling, on the saucer of fifty pence pieces – the hoopla takings. They both laughed. ‘You can’t have that,’ he said.

  She had another useless go at the coconut shy and then wandered on down the rows of stalls, only half looking now for the blue shirt. She was beginning to enjoy herself. It was the turn of the little girls, five to six, in the ring.

  A roar of laughter from a corner stall caught her attention and she wandered over. An old dresser, standing in front of draped sacking, was set up with old bits of chipped crockery. A man was hurling wooden balls at the plates and every smash was greeted by a cheer. She stood and watched for a while. It looked fun.

  ‘Come and have a go. Come on,’ the proprietor of the stall shouted, rattling the heavy balls in his enormous calloused hands. ‘Get rid of all your frustrations, ladies and gents.’ But the crowd was moving on, bored. In a moment they had gone and the stall was deserted except for Ginny. The man’s shoulders slumped. He turned away, letting the balls roll from his palms into the box. Then he caught sight of her watching. ‘Come on, darling. Want a go? Four for the price of three, seeing as it’s you.’ His shrewd eyes had spotted her new shiny wedding ring. He glanced left and right. ‘Had a spat with your old man, have you? I’ve just the thing for you. See?’ He bent and picked up a hideous jade green vase. He waddled over to the dresser and, sweeping a pile of broken china off with his arm, set up the vase on the middle shelf. ‘There you are darling. That’s him. Now. Take a good swing at it. Arm right back.’

  Grinning she took the balls from him and hurled. The first smashed a plate on the edge of the shelf. It was the fourth ball which caught the vase full on its plump shiny belly. It rocked forward twice and then plunged from the shelf, smashing into a dozen pieces on the top of the dresser.

  The man chuckled. ‘Made you feel better, didn’t it? Want another go?’

  Ginny stood there, stricken. She hadn’t meant it. She was shaken with guilt. Supposing she had harmed Malcolm in some way by smashing the vase. She hadn’t really been pretending it was him. Oh please, please, Malcolm darling, where are you? She began to look round, lost again, searching desperately for his face in the crowd.

  Puzzled, the man watched her for a moment. Then he shrugged. He waded through the broken crocks to the dresser and began to set up new plates and saucers, sweeping the debris from the shelves onto the old carpet laid on the grass below. Near the carpet was a sign. ‘Carpet for sale. Five pounds.’

  She walked quickly away, scanning the crowds again, searching everywhere for the blue shirt, aching to have Malcolm beside her.

  In the ring it was the toddlers’ race. Half of them were going the wrong way, but no one seemed to notice. The field was crowded. There were so many places he could be. In a tent, at a booth, walking like her in the crowd. Perhaps he had gone home without her? She was stricken with terror. Then she pushed away the thought. How silly. Malcolm would never do that, however angry with her. She set out to walk again, slowly, round the perimeter of the field, methodically glancing into every marquee and stall. It must be tea time, there were so many people clutching paper cups and sticky pink-iced buns. Wasps hovered over the litter bins.

  She saw him at last back where she had started, standing arms folded, his feet slightly apart, watching two boys hurl wooden balls at the china on the dresser. There was a bemused smile on his face. The man had spotted him.

  ‘Here you are, sir. Three balls for fifty pence. Small price to pay to get rid of your inhibitions, sir. Pretend it’s your old woman, sir. Really put some beef into it.’

  Ginny flinched. Surely he wasn’t going to? She watched as Malcolm fished in his pocket for the money. Then he took the balls from the man. The first thwacked into the dresser back with such force that three saucers fell. The other two followed rapidly, shattering bowls. Malcolm was grinning. ‘Thanks, chum. I needed that.’ Then he was wandering off. He never looked round once.

  Malcolm.

  She stood and watched as he disappeared into the crowd and suddenly she found she was fighting back tears, screwing up her handkerchief in her fist. She felt desolate and abandoned as she was jostled out of the way by a big bouncing woman who had spied the stall.

  ‘Come on, George. You’ve always wanted to smash the china. Come and have a go at this th
en.’ The husband, equally big and bouncing, pushed after her and squealing with laughter the pair of them threw their balls at the dresser, hurling cheery insults after each shot.

  Miserably Ginny gazed at the ground as the cascading china fell on the dim red design of the grubby carpet. It was a bit like the carpet in her parents’ dining room. The kind she had thought would look so pretty in their flat, under the white melamine table …

  She sniffed and blew her nose. Then, cautiously, she edged a bit closer trying to see the carpet better. Actually it was little more than a rug. But five pounds? It seemed too good to be true.

  ‘Want another go, love? Come on, get it all out of your system. Four balls for you, wasn’t it? Four for fifty.’ He had spotted her at once.

  She smiled at him uncertainly. ‘Actually I was looking at the carpet.’

  ‘Ah, I could tell you was a lady of discernment.’ He slipped the balls into a capacious pocket. ‘Real Persian that is. Woven in the desert and brought across the sands on the back of a camel I shouldn’t wonder. Here, have a real butchers.’ He held up the rope which held back the throwers so she could duck underneath and come closer. She walked with him to the dresser, feeling suddenly very exposed, blushing at the interested faces lined up behind her. Now that she was close she could see the carpet was horribly threadbare and torn. It was stained too beneath the piles of china. He stopped and with a flick of the wrist pulled it clear, pouring the crocks into a heap on the dusty grass. ‘Look at that. There’s real quality there. It’s an antique you know. That’s why it’s a bit worn. It’s an antique.’ He glanced at her sharply from beneath his sandy brows and she found herself smiling suddenly.

  ‘I can see it’s old,’ she murmured, seriously.

  Her finger traced the pattern of little square stylized birds round the borders. She wanted it badly, however worn. She hesitated. Malcolm would kill her of course.

  ‘Come on, darling. Make up your mind. There’s people waiting to throw.’

  ‘I’ll have it.’ She gulped a little nervously, wondering suddenly if she had five pounds in her bag.

  Solemnly he began to roll it up, carrying it effortlessly under his arm. He threw it down on the grass just beyond the rope as she scrabbled in her purse. Four pound coins and a pile of odd loose change. He counted it carefully and then he grinned. ‘Want another throw for luck? On the house?’ But she shook her head.

  The rug was surprisingly heavy. She heaved it up into her arms and then stood still. Malcolm had the car keys. She wasn’t even sure where he’d parked the wretched car. She couldn’t wander round the fête carrying a carpet. What on earth was she to do? The trouble was she couldn’t stop smiling. She was so ridiculously pleased with the thing.

  She carried it away from the crowds to an emptier corner of the field where two oak trees stood, isolated from the woods behind the hedge. Nearby three girls were giving pony rides, leading the patient animals whose heads drooped lower and lower in the heat with a succession of breathlessly excited small children clutching their manes.

  She set down the rug and carefully unrolled it on the grass, brushing off the bits of splintered china and goosegrass which still clung to it. It had a skimpy fringe on one side – at the opposite end the fringe seemed to have been shaved off. She stood and gazed at it proudly for a few minutes and then, experimentally, she knelt on it, brushing the threadbare pile with her hand. It was the first Persian rug she had ever owned.

  ‘Don’t tell me. It can fly!’ Suddenly Malcolm was standing behind her, a coconut nestled in the crook of his arm. He was laughing at her.

  She stroked it again. Protectively. ‘For all I know it can. This is the sort of place one finds magic carpets.’

  ‘What, at an Aunt Sally shy?’ He snorted with laughter. Then he came and knelt beside her, reverently putting the coconut on the rug in front of him. ‘Come on then. Ready to wish? Where do we want to go?’

  He glanced at her sideways. ‘I saw the rug too. I had a little bet with myself that you’d spot it. You know he’s got another one down there already. Even more tatty, if that’s possible.’ He put his arm round her suddenly. ‘Oh my lovely Ginny. You’ll never learn will you, sweetheart?’ He grinned again. ‘Right. I’m waiting. Where are we flying to?’

  ‘Just home? I want to see the rug down, in the flat.’ She couldn’t keep the slight note of bravado out of her voice.

  He was sitting cross legged now, palms down beside him on the rug, feeling the pile. ‘I suppose we could mend it. If it were backed in some way it might not look too bad. Funnily enough these rugs can be dreadfully shabby and yet still look nice …’

  She looked at him, her green eyes wide with astonishment. ‘But Malcolm, it’s old!’

  He grimaced at her. ‘I don’t dislike old things on principle, love. I jut want to keep our flat in one style. As it happens I think a Persian rug or two would fit. It would look lovely under my table.’ He glanced at her sideways. ‘Perhaps you’re right about that room. Perhaps it does need a little more colour to give it warmth. This would provide it, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Oh, Malcolm!’ She flung her arms round his neck and kissed him; ‘Oh Malcolm, I do love you sometimes.’ A thought struck her suddenly. ‘I saw you at the stall, breaking china. Did you really think of me when you were doing it?’

  ‘Of course. Every shot.’ His eyes were twinkling mischievously. ‘I’ll bet you had a go too. And thought of me. Didn’t you?’

  She bit her lip, trying not to laugh. ‘Well, there was this hideous green vase. And the man did say “pretend it’s your old man”.’

  ‘Did you hit it?’ he asked casually, lying back and putting his arm across his eyes.

  She giggled. ‘A bull’s-eye.’

  ‘But you’re usually such a bad shot!’ He sounded quite indignant.

  ‘Ah, but I was provoked beyond endurance.’

  ‘Just because I wanted an ice-cream?’

  ‘That’s right.’ She lay back beside him and stretched her arms ecstatically above her head. ‘I am always provoked by ice-creams, especially pink ones.’

  ‘And by white melamine tables?’

  ‘Those too.’

  He nodded sleepily. ‘As long as I know,’ he said. ‘By the way. Did you see I’d won a coconut?’

  The Proposal

  ‘Have you time for a wee crack, Aggie?’ Betty Anderson popped her head over the privet hedge and watched critically as her neighbour pushed two more tulip bulbs into the soft black soil.

  Aggie Cameron straightened her back and wiped an earthy hand on her apron. ‘What is it now, Betty? Have you yet more gossip for me, hen?’ She didn’t mean to sound impatient but she had been enjoying the peace of the crisp cold afternoon.

  She knew, however, that Betty meant well and there was always the chance that the story would be about someone Aggie had actually met. Gossip lost its enjoyable edge if you did not know the people concerned. ‘Come away in now and I’ll put on the kettle while you tell me,’ she said more softly.

  She listened as Betty, her shoes rustling through the drifting leaves, made her way down her own side of the hedge out of the little gate and in through the identical one next to it. Then she turned and led her guest into the house.

  Betty had at last learned not to offer to help. Aggie was not concerned that Betty would have made the tea in any one of a dozen kitchens. In hers, where everything had to be kept just so, no one touched anything. She did not like to be helped.

  ‘Can I ask you something, Aggie?’ She heard Betty’s voice, slightly diffident, from the fire-side chair. ‘How is it that you take so much care of the garden when you can’t …’ She hesitated, suddenly embarrassed.

  ‘Can’t see the flowers I’m planting?’ Aggie finished for her. ‘Och that’s easy, Betty. I can smell, can’t I? I can touch their soft petals and I can feel the green leaves trembling with the sap. I know you’ll think I’m foolish, but I can almost hear the flowers sing as they hang their heads and rustle
in the wind. And I can remember their colours you know.’ She smiled gently, as she set the kettle down on the gas. ‘I haven’t always been blind. I can remember fine what a garden should look like in the spring.’

  She groped for the other chair and sat down, waiting for the expected piece of gossip. For a moment there was silence and she sensed that her companion was inexplicably uncomfortable.

  ‘What is it, hen? What’s the matter? What is it you want to say to me?’

  ‘Aggie. I’ve been keeping company with Roddy Mackay. I think you know that?’

  ‘Aye. He’s a fine man.’ Aggie nodded sagely. She waited, her hands quietly folded in her lap.

  ‘I think he’s asked me to marry him, Aggie,’ Betty went on in a rush. ‘What am I to do?’

  Aggie sat for a moment, her blue eyes fixed unseeing on the kitchen fire. Then she smiled. ‘He’s a fine man, Betty, as I said. But if you only think he’s asked you and you’re not sure what to do, then I think you’d best do nothing.’

  Betty blushed a little and leaned forward. ‘I think I love him, Aggie. I go weak-kneed and foolish as a schoolgirl when he comes to the house. It’s ten years since my man died. I’ve not felt like this since I was courting him.’

  Aggie rose stiffly and went to the kettle, her hand going without hesitation to the handle.

  ‘Have you made up your mind what to say to him then?’

  There was silence. Then Betty said. ‘The trouble is Aggie, I’m not minded to leave my house. I’ve lived here too long. I’ve no desire to go up the mountain to Craigbeg.’

  Aggie nodded. The two of them lived in pleasant little cottages and the gardens were beautiful. It took someone young and agile to live in the hills. Someone like her niece Alison and her husband. She remembered how they had gone for a drive up the glen and come back thrilled with the beauties of Craigbeg. They had even wanted, dreamily, to buy the place for themselves. How wonderful it would have been if they could live near her, close at hand. But Mackay had rudely refused their tentative offer for his cottage. And why not? He lived there himself. Now, if only … But Aggie firmly put the thought behind her.