The Bower Bird

by Ann Kelley

  ‘Gussie,’ she said, ‘Don’t you think we have More than Enough Problems at the Moment without Looking for More?’

  She’s right of course, but I feel very frustrated not being able to do anything for homeless people. Mum says it’s a government issue. If everyone votes for whoever they believe in, the country might stand a chance of being run properly and maybe there would be no homeless people on the streets. She does buy the Big Issue though.

  Dad isn’t really homeless as he rents a flat in London, but I am Dadless and Mum is husbandless.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  I KNOW WHY I chose the attic over the other more accessible rooms for my bedroom.

  It’s because attics and towers are where heroes and heroines are incarcerated in fairy tales. Rapunzel hung her long hair out of the tower window so her lover could climb up to her. The little princes didn’t do very well in their tower, did they? And Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came. In Jane Eyre there’s a mad woman shut in the attic. A poor servant girl sleeps in a garret in the Hans Andersen fairy tale ‘The Bottle Neck’. I wonder if A Room of One’s Own is an attic? It probably is. And of course, poor Anne Frank had to hide from the Nazis in an Amsterdam attic.

  My room is a warm nest in the roof, close to the sky, above all the ordinary life of the town. It’s especially wonderful with the gulls to keep me company. They are totally oblivious of humans except when we seem to threaten their young: open a window near the nest, open a curtain, that sort of thing.

  Our juvenile is a pain in the bum. He’s still wheezing and whingeing all day long, lowering his gawky head between his speckled shoulders and having a good grizzle. I’m surprised his mother hasn’t pushed him over the edge of the roof and made him fly. Perhaps he’s flight-featherly challenged or frightened of heights. Perhaps I should be sorry for him but I have more sympathy for his long-suffering parents. Only a parent could love an adolescent herring gull.

  After my bath I search my armpits and crotch for signs of hair but no luck yet. I’m pubicly challenged.

  I apply cream lavishly to my itchy scar but it doesn’t help for more than a minute or two. If I do ever have a boyfriend I won’t want him to see my scar. It’s hideous: red and lumpy. Mum says it is Of No Importance. Anyway, if I have a heart-lung transplant, I will be opened up again like a can of beans, or rather, like a box of cornflakes, so there’s not much point in worrying about this particular bodily flaw. My friend Summer worries about her looks all the time, even though she’s very pretty. She wants to be taller, thinner, blonder.

  I would just like to be pinker.

  I hang the Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy bath towel out of the window to dry.

  Daddy was a great fan of the radio serial years ago and still quotes stuff from it like ‘Don’t panic’ – and he bought Mummy this towel years ago, before I was born, but now it’s mine. It’s a faded red-brown on one side and white on the other, has frayed ends and a message woven into it. When I’m in the bath and can’t read a book I try to read the words on the towel. That’s not easy without glasses, but as I practically know it off by heart I guess some of the words.

  It goes something like this.

  The Hitch Hiker’s Guide has lots to say about towels. A towel is just about the most useful thing you can take with you, because you can dry yourself, use it as a weapon when it’s wet, wrap yourself in it to keep warm, and use it as a sail. It’s also of psychological value as any strag (non hitch-hiker) would think that anyone who can keep his towel with him through all the perils of galaxy travel is a man to be reckoned with. 24/25.

  I’m not sure what 24/25 means. It might be the date or it might be that our towel is number 24 out of 25 that were produced, like photographers write on their limited edition prints. That would make it very rare and valuable one day, if it was in perfect condition, which it certainly isn’t. But it would be an excellent thing to have with me on my desert island.

  I am going to take more photographs. I’ve decided. I have taken a few of the cats, but they move too much and I can’t keep refocusing with my glasses on or off.

  There’s still unexposed pictures on my film. I hope the washing line photos look okay.

  The fisherman’s lodges are little shacks on the harbour wall. A flag flies at half-mast. Shamrock Lodge is on its own at the top of a slipway next to the Sloop Inn. On the wooden walls there are faded photographs of lovely old fishing boats with brown sails. The harbour was once a forest of masts. There’s a metal stove, unlit of course, because it’s still summer, just about; benches around the walls and long tables. In here you feel like you are in another time, shut away from the noise of tourists.

  I feel shy of taking pictures of the men playing dominoes, but they are very relaxed about me being here. When I knocked at the door and asked if I could take some pictures they said they didn’t mind.

  ‘School project, is it?’ a small thin man asks.

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘Saw you in parish church last week, didn’t us, my cheel’? Arthur Stevens’ funeral?’

  ‘I’m Gussie Stevens.’

  ‘You’m one of we, my girl.’

  One of we? One of us. I feel proud. I feel like an impostor.

  ‘I’m Jackson Stevens’ daughter. He lives in London but my mother and I live here now.’

  ‘Up London eh?’

  ‘He’s a filmmaker.’ (He is, sort of.)

  ‘Following in his footsteps are you?’

  ‘Following in his footsteps? Oh, I suppose I am.’ Another foot metaphor!

  A herring gull stomps around on the roof, screeching angrily. The four men go back to their dominoes.

  I take off my glasses and focus on the men’s faces. They are tanned and lined like Grandpop’s was by life, sorrow and laughter; their pale eyes used to looking at the far horizon. I suddenly see they are so much more beautiful than young faces, which are blank empty pages.

  They wear flat caps, except one who wears a battered sea captain’s cap. They ignore me, intent on the game, slapping down the little bricks with a loud crack on the wooden table. I always thought dominoes was a pointless game needing little or no skill, but the men are concentrated, passionate. There must be more to it than I thought.

  Alistair says cricket is like that. It gets more interesting the more you study it. He’s taking Mum and me to a game on Saturday. Do I really want to go and watch a load of men try to hit a bunch of sticks with a ball? Or another man try to hit the ball with a stick?

  I remove one film from the camera and replace it with another. I include the thick shaft of light striping the dark wall and floor, the pictures, the old radio on a shelf. They are keeping a part of their old life alive in this little hut. I take a picture of a motto in Cornish on the wall – Meor ras ma Dew. ‘Great thanks to God.’

  So Porthmeor means great beach, I suppose.

  ‘Have you been to Shore an’ Rose?’

  ‘What’s shorn rose?’

  ‘The other two lodges, my flower, other side of slip.’

  ‘Will it be all right for me to go there?’

  ‘Aye, they won’t mind. We’re used to being looked at. We’m a dying breed.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ I’m embarrassed and don’t know what to say. Do I look like I’m studying them as if they are pigmies or aboriginals?

  ‘Tell ’em you’re a Stevens. ’Es, one o’ we.’

  I thank them, put on my glasses, pick up the empty film cassette and leave.

  There are still plenty of holiday people around, mostly the ‘tea and pee brigade’ or Saga louts, Mum calls them, coach parties of elderly people hugging the narrow pavements and using walking sticks like weapons. They seem to be having a lovely time. They have North Country and Birmingham accents, so I expect they aren’t used to white sand and blue sea.

  It makes me smile when a man with a Chelsea Football T-shirt has his carton of chips stolen from his hands by a clever gull. He turns his head for a moment and suddenly his chips ar
e gone. He looks so surprised. They’re genius scavengers.

  There are letters to the local paper about the ‘gull problem’ nearly every week, but I think the answer lies not in a gull cull, but in people not eating pasties and chips in the streets. I’m on the gulls’ side in this. Give me gulls over people eating smelly food in the street any time. Perhaps the local council or whoever makes decisions should stop allowing fast food outlets in the town. But I suppose they need the money.

  I give the other fishermen’s lodges a miss, as I’m tired. It takes it out of me, walking and doing things. I’m spending today in bed, veging out. Mum has taken my film to be developed in Penzance.

  She has made a little pond in our garden. She’s planted a miniature bamboo next to it and we have put in the proper oxygenating weeds. Can’t wait for Mr Toad to discover it and entice a mate to lay eggs there next spring. I like watching tadpoles.

  I hope we get newts. Mum said when she was little she bought a newt from a girl over the road who had a huge pond, to put in Grandma’s tiny pond that was part of a rockery, and the newt disappeared, so she bought another one from the same girl. One day she saw her newt crossing the road, making for his old pond. She was really mad. She’d spent her pocket money on the same newt. When she was ten she was walking in a marshy field near a pond with two friends and one of them picked up a creature from the grass. It’s a lizard, she said. Mum said, ‘No it isn’t, it’s a newt,’ and to prove it she took it and threw it into the water, where they watched it drown. Her friends didn’t speak to her for ages, and she has Never Forgiven Herself. She hasn’t had much luck with newts. Perhaps this time it will be different.

  I have a terrarium in my room. It’s actually a fish tank with no water. Instead it has earth, stones and little plants from the hedge. I’m going to catch a lizard and keep it for a while to study it. I’ve seen a few on the hedge in front of the house and I am keeping watch for one right now. Charlie’s sitting patiently next to me, hoping I’m after some tasty four-legged furry creature for her tea. Well, no, I don’t think you’d like lizard sandwich, Charlie.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  MUM’S GOT A renewal reminder from the library. Luckily, I get to the post before she does and put the letter in my pocket.

  To play for time I go to the library and renew the books. I can hardly tell Mum I left them in the Memorial Gardens while I attended the funeral of someone I didn’t know.

  But what can I tell her? Or shall I just tell the library the books are lost and pay for them?

  It’s like the horse story when I was at Sunday School. I told my Sunday School teacher I had a horse when I didn’t, and the lie followed me like a malevolent spirit until I was found out. I haven’t told a lie since, until I threw away the books. I’m in deep shit.

  Mum has always said that telling lies is a complete no-no. It’s because of Daddy, of course. She said she can’t ever trust him again, since his infidelity with TLE.

  Why did I lie about the books? Guilt, self-preservation, denial. She would be shocked that I went to a complete stranger’s funeral. Mum doesn’t really want me to contact Daddy’s family. She acts as if she’s angry with them as well as Daddy. But it’s my family too. My family! I’m angry with her. It’s her fault I have to lie to her. Why can’t I tell her that? She doesn’t realise she’s forcing me into a life of deception. I’ll spend sleepless nights of scheming and skulduggery. I’ll be cunning and shifty, sneaky and furtive, so much more interesting than being honest and open, except I don’t think I can keep it up. It’s too wearing. Perhaps the library people will give up. Perhaps I could go and tell them she has left the country and I think she took the books with her because she needs Small Garden Design and Building a Wildlife Pond in Australia. Perhaps not. Anyway, it’s hardly first-degree murder is it, lying? Or maybe it is the first step towards hell and damnation.

  My lizard is boring. He stands on a twig and stares at nothing. There’s plenty of garden stuff in there with him, like leaves and earth and pebbles, but he doesn’t seem interested in exploring. Perhaps he’s depressed, being imprisoned and observed. I find a grasshopper for him to eat. It takes ages. I thought it would be easy, but it isn’t. I feel terrible choosing a creature to be sacrificed. I have all this power to destroy.

  Once when I was visiting Grandma and Grandpop I was on the stone jetty near where they lived, watching boys fishing for crabs, and I was horrified when the boys jumped on the crabs, crushed them with their shoes and threw them back. I had thought they were going to take them off the mussel bait and put them back in the water. I shouted at them and when they laughed at me I pushed one of the boys in. It wasn’t deep but it was cold and he was suitably humiliated. His friend couldn’t stop laughing so I pushed him in too. I have a quick temper, Grandma says – said. I inherited it from my mother.

  My lizard has grabbed the grasshopper by its back legs and has been hanging on to it for ages, simply sucking it. Why doesn’t it swallow it? I have been watching it for half an hour and the lizard hasn’t moved. It’s as if it is paralysed. The doomed grasshopper occasionally jerks in a feeble attempt to escape the jaws of the dragon, but the lizard, grim-mouthed, keeps hold. I don’t like the lack of expression in its eyes. I used to be fond of lizards, I’m not so sure now. I can’t watch any more, it’s horrible. The grasshopper will die from starvation and terror before it gets eaten. What do grasshoppers eat, anyway? I’ll release the lizard tomorrow.

  Maybe insects should be my line of study, or spiders. I don’t mind them. Mum does. She cringes when one gets in the bath and I have to rescue it for her. There are little black jumping spiders in the grass. They leap about to escape me when I try to catch them. I like the long-legged garden spiders best. They walk slowly as if balancing on stilts, blown off balance by the slightest breeze. Their legs are like fine human hair.

  We don’t have a spider book. I miss all the old books on wildlife there were at Peregrine Cottage. I think I’ll start spending pocket money on second-hand books. There’s always a good selection at the car boot sales and there’s a big second-hand bookshop in town.

  I find a good spider book – The Spiders and Allied Orders of the British Isles by Theodore H Savory.

  Pholcidae – very long-legged spider – lives in southeast counties of England, but we are in the far southwest, so maybe this isn’t my long-legged spider. I’m pretty sure it isn’t because ours has a round body and this has a long body. Bet there aren’t any books on Cornish spiders. I’ve found it. It’s Leiobnum rotundum. ‘Only the male’s body is round. It is rusty brown with no obvious markings apart from the black eye-turret. The female’s body is oval and paler with a dark, more or less rectangular saddle. Both sexes have long, hair-like black legs.’

  I have liberated the lizard with SED – Sadistic Eating Disorder. Now I have an empty terrarium. I remember when I was little we had a silk worm farm at school. I wonder where we got the leaves for it? Silk worms only eat mulberry leaves. And I had an ant farm once in a large jam jar, and a worm farm in between two sheets of glass that Grandpop made for me.

  Our little pond is already swarming with life, mosquito larvae mostly, Culex pipiens probably as they are the most common. They wriggle under water, jerkily, but when I get close to the pond they dive backwards together and disappear, like formation swimmers in a Busby Berkeley movie. We bought two water snails, Limniaea stagnalis I think they are, but they seem to have mated and produced lots of babies. Jumping Jiminy Cricket, that was quick work. There’s loads of Daphnia, or water fleas.

  I have an Observer’s Book of Pond Life. There are some wonderful water bugs I’ve never heard of: Water Cricket, Water Measurer, Long Water Scorpion and Pond Skater. The only one I have heard of is the Water Boatman.

  Bugs possess a sucking beak called a rostrum with which most of them pierce their prey and suck out their juices. Yuk, even life in our little pond is fraught with danger.

  Then there are the water beetles: Mud Dweller, Great Silver Bee
tle, Screech Beetle, Great Diving Beetle, and there’s even a Whirligig Beetle. Fly and moth larvae and pupae lurk in the vegetation near the surface. Water mites and water spiders live in ponds too. It’s going to be crowded. With luck we’ll have Damsel Flies and Dragon Flies.

  Perhaps we should turn the whole garden into a pond with little bridges for the cats to walk over.

  Mr Toad hunkers in his John Innes compost bag. I wonder if he thinks he is John Innes, with his name on the door of his home, like Winnie the Pooh’s friend, Piglet, who lived in a house with a notice that said TRESPASSERS W. Piglet said it had been in his family for generations and his Grandfather’s name was William and that is what the W stood for.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  I AM FEELING rather miserable today. Daddy phoned. He’s off to some film festival in France. I don’t know why I did it, maybe to escape from the wrath of Mum and the library authorities, but I suddenly blurted out ‘Can I come too?’ He says he can’t be looking after me while he’s in conference with directors and producers etc. Sure. Yeah, I understand. I’ll be in the way. He’ll be looking for a replacement for The Lovely Eloise. Some new young starlet with fake tits and legs up to her armpits. What if my donor heart and lungs are suddenly available and we have to go to London straight away? He won’t be there. Where will Mummy stay? He won’t be at my bedside. I don’t want him to leave the country. I don’t want them to be divorced. I need a family.

  I spend the day in my attic, my turret room, my garret, my lofty tower, the cats surrounding me, trying to comfort me. Rain hammers on the roof, and the wind is howling in sympathy with my emotions. I am a victim, a hard-done-by heroine with the world against me. No one understands me except Charlie, who curls up on my tummy and gazes at me sorrowfully with her viridian eyes.

  ‘Gussie! Gussie! There’s someone for you.’

  I ignore Mum. It’s probably the library police. I’ve been shopped by the tramp, the only witness of my crime and delinquency. (I found that word in our Chambers. It means failure or omission of duty.)