by Sue Townsend
Sandra looked through the floor at the decomposing rat lying among the stacked-up rubbish, and had the melancholy thought that it wouldn’t matter how much money and status she and Arthur accumulated, there would always be a rat under the floor.
‘Anyroad up,’ said Arthur, turning to look at her, ‘’ow did you get on with Princess Michael?’
‘It was a waste of my time an’ your money,’ said Sandra. ‘She told me to buy a string of pearls, keep my tits covered up, drop my hems and keep my legs together when I’m sitting down.’
Arthur sighed and looked down again through the floor. The rat was waving its dead paw at him. He knew it was the flow of the water that was manipulating the dead beast, but he couldn’t get the idea out of his mind that the rat was somehow taking the piss.
On the last night of Graham’s visit, Camilla went into the kitchen to feed the dogs and found Graham at the window staring disapprovingly at the chickens at the end of the garden.
Later that night, seeing him writing, Camilla made one last effort to engage with him and asked, ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m filling in a risk assessment sheet for this place,’ he said without lifting his head.
Charles looked up from his book and said, ‘Might we be party to your, er… conclusions?’
Graham said, ‘I’m afraid not. It would be more than my job’s worth to breach the laws of commercial confidentiality.’
When Charles and Camilla were washing up in the kitchen together, she whispered, ‘It’s bound to take time to get to actually love him, isn’t it?’
Charles said, ‘That’s what Nanny said to me about my dislike of cod liver oil, but I still can’t stand it.’ He shuddered. Camilla was not sure what had caused this response – the memory of cod liver oil or Graham – but she was determined to be positive.
She tried to fall asleep that night by counting Graham’s good points. He had lovely handwriting, he could whistle in tune, he lowered the seat after using the lavatory, his shoes were always polished, he didn’t swear… but the list was not long enough. She lay awake worrying until Charles’s deep breathing lulled her to sleep.
43
The next morning Charles and Camilla walked in hazy sunshine with Graham as he trundled his suitcase to the security checkpoint, where he had arranged for a taxi to take him to the station. All three of them were privately pleased that Graham was going home. He was not an easy person to live with; every piece of food he put in his mouth was subject to an almost forensic investigation, both its provenance and wholesomeness being questioned. Only that morning Graham had interrogated Charles on the precise age of the rashers of bacon on his plate. There were other things about him that unsettled his parents: the way he shouted, ‘Help! Help!’ in his sleep; his habit of walking into a room and saying, ‘Ha!’ before walking out again.
To compensate for not loving her son, Camilla held on to Graham for an uncomfortably long time. It was Charles who said, ‘Let him go, darling. The taxi is waiting.’
Charles hesitated; should he embrace his son or offer him his hand? He need not have worried. Graham passed his ID card to Peter Penny, who was on duty at the checkpoint, and was ushered through to the outside world. He gave a brief wave and was gone.
As they retraced their steps towards Hell Close, Freddie, Tosca and Leo ran to met them, united in their happiness at Graham’s departure.
Camilla said, ‘The dogs look terribly happy.’
‘Why shouldn’t they?’ said Charles. ‘They know nothing about the proposed dog laws, poor empty-headed things. They live an ideal life.’
‘And what is your ideal life?’ asked Camilla.
‘In my ideal life,’ said Charles, ‘we would live very simply in a tiny shack in a wilderness somewhere. We would keep warm and cook over an open fire. We would have very few possessions, a few rough cooking pots, a plate, cup and bowl each. A knife, fork and spoon.’
‘A bed?’ prompted Camilla.
‘A plank bed, covered in animal skins.’ Charles sighed happily, imagining himself and Camilla making love in the firelight with the wind howling outside.
‘And where would this shack be?’ asked Camilla.
‘Oh, I don’t know, darling. Scotland, perhaps… Rannoch Moor,’ said Charles.
Camilla said, ‘It will be terribly cold in the winter, darling. What will we do during the long dark days and nights?’
‘We’d survive, darling,’ said Charles. ‘We’d collect wood and hunt for our food, and make our own clothes and boots.’
‘Would we?’ said Camilla.
‘We’d have to, darling,’ he said. ‘We’d be beyond Harrod’s delivery zone.’
Camilla saw that he wasn’t joking and said, hesitantly, ‘I think I’d like to be a little closer to London, darling.’
‘Where?’ asked Charles.
‘Gloucestershire has some terribly wild places,’ said Camilla.
Charles said censoriously, ‘Yes, Gloucester city centre on a Friday night is horribly wild.’
Camilla said, ‘Oh please don’t sulk, Charlie. I’m sure we’d be terribly happy in a shack on Rannoch Moor, but I’d be equally happy in a lovely old house with the dogs and a few horses, within driving distance of a Marks and Spencer’s chilled food cabinet. It’s being together that counts.’
There was a long silence, during which time Charles checked Leo’s back paws for stones.
Camilla said, ‘You ought to tell your mother that you’ve decided.’
‘Decided what?’ asked Charles.
‘Decided you don’t want to be king,’ said Camilla.
Although Gin and Tonic were on different floors of the Excelsior Dog Hotel, they kept in touch by barking to each other at frequent intervals. Tonic was inclined to panic when the hour for his injection passed without any sign of a member of staff. At such times, Gin urged Tonic to howl for attention and continue until somebody came.
The hotel boasted in its promotional literature that the dogs received ‘five-star attention, two mouthwatering home-cooked meals a day, long walks and a fun and games hour’. Tonic, who was in the cheaper annexe, expected nothing, but Gin was bitterly disappointed. The two mouth-watering home-cooked meals proved to be a portion of cow’s hide which had simmered in a bucket on top of a filthy stove in the kennel kitchen. The long walk was a quick trip on a lead with the owner to the off-licence and back. The fun and games hour consisted of the owner’s teenage son throwing a rubber bone in a desultory fashion in a concrete compound.
When Graham came to pick up the dogs, he said, ‘Did you have a lovely time, Gin? Did you? Did you?’
Gin barked, ‘You were ripped off, Graham. The owner’s a drunk and her son is a tormenting brute.’
When Tonic was let out of his cage, Graham did not acknowledge his existence. But Gin rushed up to greet his companion and lover, and the two dogs rubbed heads and exchanged smells.
‘We’ll never spend another day or night apart,’ barked Gin, who was alarmed at Tonic’s condition. ‘Look at you; your eyes are glazed, you’ve lost weight and your nose is dry.’
‘I’m so thirsty,’ rasped Tonic.
‘You need insulin,’ diagnosed Gin.
When they arrived at the Ruislip bungalow, Graham had to carry Tonic from the car into the kitchen. Gin watched anxiously as the exhausted Tonic was almost thrown into his basket.
Gin barked, ‘Give him his insulin, Graham.’
But Graham was tired after his long journey; he was also emotionally drained.
After living in the Fez, Graham found the bungalow unnervingly quiet; the only sound came from the ticking of the cuckoo clock and Tonic’s ragged breathing. At precisely the same time that a drunken and stoned Miranda was trying, and failing, to fit her key into the lock of her front door, Graham was woken by Gin frantically barking and scratching at the kitchen door. Graham stumbled out of bed and injected Tonic with painful haste.
Before Graham fell asleep again, he wondered how Miranda
would react when he told her that he was second in line to the throne. The beautiful Chantelle had not seemed particularly impressed. He decided that he would wait until he found out what Miranda’s political affiliations were. For all he knew, she could be an ardent Cromwellian – there had to be something wrong with Miranda. His adoptive father had warned him that all women were unstable and harboured dark secrets. It might be safer if he didn’t put all of his eggs in the same basket, but kept a couple back in their cardboard carton, in a high cupboard, behind a locked door.
44
Miranda’s entrapment of Graham Cracknall was accomplished within ten minutes of their first sitting down together at an alcove table for two in the golf-themed lounge of The Mouse and Cheese. Miranda was wearing a white, full-skirted dress with a Peter Pan collar. She had made her face up skilfully so that it looked as though she was wearing no make-up.
Miranda had studied ‘The Psychological and Physiological Triggers in Male Reproduction’ at the De Montfort University, and she knew what men liked and what left them cold. So she let Graham do most of the talking and agreed with everything he said. She lowered her voice and laughed at his jokes. She looked at him with rapt attention and glanced away shyly when he paid her a clumsy compliment. She endured his re-enactment of tiddlywink competitions in which he had triumphed, without showing the slightest sign of boredom. She even begged him to repeat some of his tiddlywink strategies, saying, ‘Graham, tell me again how you managed to tiddle the yellow wink into the cup by bypassing the red and green.’
Graham illustrated his past triumphs by using pieces of beer mat he had torn up before eventually being loudly reprimanded from behind the bar by the surly landlord. Graham shouted from the alcove, ‘I’m a health and safety inspector and your pork pies should be stored in a chill cabinet. They should not be flaunted on top of the bar.’
Miranda forced herself to ignore the waves of hatred emanating from the golf-sweatered customers and kept her eyes on Graham, who had told her he was wearing his father’s Sunday best clothes. She had nodded enthusiastically when he said, ‘It would have been stupid to throw them away, there’s years of wear in them yet.’
Over glasses of orange juice Miranda told her sad, fictional, life story. Orphaned in a train crash, brought up by a cruel aunt, sent to a convent school, befriended by a saintly nun, Sister Anastasia, who made the young Miranda sign a pledge that she would be chaste until marriage.
When the landlord shouted across, ‘Are you two going to sit there nursing that orange juice all bloody day?’ Miranda picked up her coat and said, ‘Perhaps we’d better go.’
By the time Graham walked out of the pub with Miranda on his arm, he felt two inches taller. Had he been a stag, he would have challenged any man in the pub to an antler fight. Now, at last, he understood about women. It was why Napoleon tried to conquer Europe – he wanted to impress Josephine. It was the same for Hitler – he lost his way over Eva Braun. There was no still, quiet voice inside Graham’s head asking why a stunningly beautiful girl like Miranda needed to search on a website for a partner.
When Graham mentioned that he would have to go home soon to let the dogs out, Miranda gushed, ‘I love dogs.’
Gin and Tonic were in the kitchen listening to Gardeners’ Question Time, when they heard Graham’s voice outside the house. The dogs pricked up their ears and Gin said, ‘We’d better go to the door and greet him, show a bit of enthusiasm.’
Tonic yapped, ‘You go, I’m waiting for Bob Flower-dew’s tip of the week.’
Gin whimpered, ‘Come with me, Tonic. You need to earn some brownie points.’
Tonic growled, ‘Look, I don’t like Graham. Graham doesn’t like me. End of.’
They heard Graham’s key scratching in the lock and a female voice saying, ‘Orphaned, by a runaway hover mower! How awful, Graham.’
Tonic barked, ‘He’s brought a woman home! This I must see. I bet she’s a reject from the Argos queue!’
The dogs ran into the hallway, barking excitedly, and saw Graham helping a dark-haired woman off with her coat.
Tonic yapped, ‘Beauty and the Beast.’
Gin yelped, ‘I expected a gruesome twosome.’
They frisked about at Graham’s feet and Miranda said, ‘Oh, Graham, Skye terriers! They’re adorable.’
Gin sat up on his hind legs and held out a paw to Miranda.
‘Gin wants you to shake his hand,’ said Graham.
Miranda bent down and held Gin’s small paw. She laughed, ‘I’m very pweezed to meet you, ickle sir.’
Tonic growled, ‘Jesus Christ! Ickle sir? Pweezed!’
Graham frowned down and said, ‘Be careful of Tonic, he’s a very nasty piece of work. He’s diabetic so he’s prone to irrational mood swings.’
‘Does he bite?’ asked Miranda, taking a step backwards.
‘When his blood sugar’s low,’ said Graham.
He shepherded Miranda through into the living room and opened the French doors to the garden. The dogs ran out for a pee. When they returned, Graham and Miranda were sitting on the sofa holding hands. There was a soppy expression on Graham’s face that they had never seen before.
Miranda was saying, ‘When was the last time you bought any new clothes for yourself, Graham?’
The transformation of Graham Cracknall had begun.
Miranda’s sexual seduction of Graham started an hour and a half later, after a Sunday tea of salmon-paste sandwiches, and a tin of fruit cocktail with evaporated milk. It was a tricky one for Miranda, who had to make an apparent journey from shy virgin to willing sexual partner. She started by toying with the half cherry from the fruit cocktail, holding it on the tip of her tongue and trying to tease Graham into taking it from her with his own tongue.
They were soon exchanging small pieces of fruit from mouth to mouth. Then, as though maddened by desire, Miranda dipped her fingers into the fruit syrup in her glass dish and asked Graham to lick them clean. She then undid the buttons under the Peter Pan collar and smeared some of the evaporated milk across the rise of her breasts.
Tonic was disgusted. ‘What a waste of good food,’ he snapped.
Both dogs were relieved when Miranda murmured in Graham’s ear, ‘God forgive me, Sister Anastasia, but who could resist such a man?’ and took Graham into his bedroom.
A few minutes later, Miranda lay underneath Graham as he huffed and puffed on top of her, and thought, the things I do for the party!
She had known from the way that he tapped out of time to the Glenn Miller record playing in The Mouse and Cheese that he had no sense of rhythm, and so it proved in bed. He was like an impatient man driving in slow traffic. He appeared to take no notice of her at all, let alone any sexual needs she might have.
Graham’s bedroom could have belonged to a ten-year-old boy. There was a shelf full of battered soft toys, including a pig. Graham’s one endearment so far to her had been, ‘You’re a silly little piglet, aren’t you?’
On Monday morning Miranda reported back to Boy and his election strategy team. First she projected the photographs she had taken of Graham in the garden of the bungalow, in the time between the salmon-paste sandwiches and the sex.
Miranda was relieved of her usual media duties, and for the following week she concentrated on her preparations for capturing Graham Cracknall’s heart. An aide was sent to Hamleys to buy a luxury games compendium; she was a fast learner and was soon conversant with the basic rules of ludo, dominoes, backgammon, snakes and ladders, and Cluedo. More difficult to her was injecting a measure of bubbliness into her depressive personality. She practised girlish giggles, hair flicking and tried to adopt a remorselessly cheerful outlook, and, although normally fiercely competitive, she allowed Graham to beat her at the games they played, before ‘getting down to business’, as Graham called it.
On the nights she didn’t see him, she drank and drugged herself into a state of insensibility.
The Chancellor and the Prime Minister were co-hosting a rec
eption at Number Ten for the Chinese Minister of Trade. The Chancellor took an opportunity, when Jack was between introductions, to draw him away to a corner of the room. After checking that they were out of earshot, the Chancellor asked, ‘Have you read about Mao Tse-tung’s eradication of the four pests?’
‘No,’ said Jack. ‘What were they?’
‘The extermination of rats, mosquitoes, flies and sparrows. The point is,’ said the Chancellor, ‘he wanted to add a fifth, but was persuaded out of it by his advisers.’
Jack said irritably, ‘For fuck’s sake, get to the fucking point.’
‘The fifth was dogs,’ said the Chancellor. ‘If it was unwise for Mao Tse-tung to try to eradicate dogs, then it’s wrong for you. Prime Minister, this is England.’
45
Violet Toby and the Queen were looking into the open door of the Queen’s wardrobe, trying to select an out-fit that the Queen could wear to Grice’s investiture. The Queen was in her underslip and stockinged feet; Beverley Threadgold had been round first thing to wash the Queen’s hair and set it, into fat pink plastic rollers. Violet felt that she would swoon with delight as each beautiful silken outfit was taken out of its plastic cover and laid on the bed to be examined.
She asked, ‘Why don’t you wear any of this lovely stuff, Liz?’
The Queen said, ‘Silk clothes like these need a good foundation, Vi, and I simply can’t be bothered to struggle into a corset every morning.’
‘Nor me,’ said Violet, looking mournfully at her lumpy un-corseted bum in the glass. ‘You wouldn’t believe I once ’ad a eighteen-inch waist, would you?’
‘No,’ said the Queen, ‘I would not!’
Eventually, after a long deliberation, they chose a coat and dress in duck-egg blue silk which had a matching hat and shoes for the Queen. Violet squeezed herself into a frock and jacket in emerald green, which the Queen had worn only weeks after Prince Edward’s birth, before she had quite recovered her figure.
Violet marvelled at the tiny hand-stitching on the hem and cuffs, and said, ‘It’s the most loveliest thing I’ve ever ’ad on my back.’
